Mr A Bedir v Kanki Turkish Meze and Cocktail Bar Ltd: 6025147/2025
JUDGMENT
[1]The name of the respondent is changed to “Kanki Turkish Meze & Cocktail Bar Limited”.[2]The claimant’s claims with the above case number are dismissed under rule 47 of the Employment Tribunal Procedure Rules 2024.REASONS
[1]The claims made in these proceedings were stated in the ET1 claim form in a less than clear way. The claimant claimed among other things that the respondent “discriminated me to pay me less than British workers”. He also claimed that the respondent “refused to pay my money and said they keep one week wages inside to hold it without telling me”.[2]The name of the respondent should probably have been “Kanki Turkish Meze & Cocktail Bar Limited”, as that was the name used in the ET3 form. If the claimant had attended the hearing then I would have asked him whether he agreed that the name of the respondent should be changed accordingly. In his absence, and after the hearing had ended, I concluded that the name should be so changed.[3]On 21 May 2026, the claimant sent an email to the tribunal in the following terms. “Dear Sir/ Madam. I Ali bedir will not be available to attending to this hearing because My mother had heart attack and she is still in critical condition at antalya hospital. I am currently abroad at hospital. I can attend this hearing can you please postpone this hearing to another date”.[4]On 27 May 2026, the tribunal sent a letter to the parties in the following terms. ‘Dear Claimant & Respondent, The case file has been referred to Employment Judge Hutchings who directs me to write as follows: “An employment judge cannot consider the request to postpone the hearing as email request has not been copied to the respondent. The claimant is referred to rule 90 of the Employment Tribunal Procedure Rules 2024 (copied below). Any request to postpone must include evidence supporting the reason for the postpone, otherwise if cannot be considered by the respondent or the Tribunal. Correspondence with the Tribunal: copying to other parties 90.—(1) Where a party sends a communication to the Tribunal it must send a copy to all other parties, and state that it has done so (by use of “cc” or otherwise). (2) Paragraph (1) does not apply to an application for an order under rule 34 (requirement to give evidence) or to the detailed grounds accompanying an application under rule 93(4) (national security proceedings). (3) The Tribunal may order a departure from this rule where it considers it in the interests of justice to do so.”’[5]The claimant did not send a further email to the tribunal, copying it to the respondent, repeating his application for a postponement of the hearing. The respondent therefore attended the hearing, but, as stated above, the claimant did not attend the hearing.[6]In the “Respondent’s response” to the claim (“the respondent’s response”), that is to say the detailed reasons for resisting it, the respondent stated that the claimant had worked for the respondent for only two days and that it accepted that it owed the claimant pay for those two days. From what the respondent said in the response it was clear that the claimant had been dismissed after those two days. There was no need to state here what the respondent said in its response about why that dismissal had occurred.[7]The respondent said in paragraph 24 of its response that because the claimant had not filled out the “HR forms”, he had not given the respondent sufficient information in order to enable the respondent to give him that pay. It was said in paragraph 16 of the respondent’s response that the claimant had said that he wanted to be paid in cash only.[8]Mr Firmin told me that the respondent accepted that it owed the claimant £244.20, gross, before the deduction of income tax and national insurance contributions.[9]I asked why the claimant had not been paid that money via a cheque and was told that the claimant had not given the respondent a current address to which the cheque would have needed to be sent.[10]In those circumstances, I concluded that it would not be appropriate to give judgment for the claimant, because the respondent would be unable to satisfy the judgment and was willing to pay the claimant the pay that it accepted he was owed.[11]Given that the claimant had not attended the hearing, rule 47 of the Employment Tribunal Procedure Rules 2024 applied. That provides: “If a party fails to attend or to be represented at a hearing, the Tribunal may dismiss the claim or proceed with the hearing in the absence of that party. Before doing so, it must consider any information which is available to it, after any enquiries that may be practicable, about the reasons for the party’s absence.”[12]I decided that the claim should be dismissed on the basis that it was in the interests of justice to do so not least because it appeared to me that the claimant was not intent on pursuing his claims.[13]I add that the claimant may apply for a reconsideration of this judgment under rule 69 of the Employment Tribunal Procedure Rules 2024. Such an application would need to be made within 14 days of the sending of this judgment to the parties and would need to “set out why reconsideration of the original decision is necessary”. An extension of time could be granted for the making of such an application, but there would have to be good reason for such an extension. More importantly, the claimant would need to be able to show that there was good reason for him not attending the hearing, even if only by video, which (by asking the tribunal to send him a digital link to the hearing) he could have done even from Turkey. He could then have pressed his application for an adjournment until he was back in the United Kingdom.[14]I add too that my recording in paragraph 8 above of the acceptance by the respondent that it owes the claimant two days’ pay means that the claimant can be sure that he will receive that pay if he provides the respondent with an address to which a cheque could be sent, or a bank account number into which the money owed him (after the necessary tax deductions have been made) could be paid. Approved by