An employment tribunal in England has ordered an engineering company to pay three months’ notice pay to a prospective employee for withdrawing a job offer without notice before the agreed start date.
The case of Mr Kankanalaplli v Loesche Energy Systems warns employers of the risks of withdrawing a contract of employment before the agreed start date and reminds employers than job offers can be legally binding once an offer is accepted.
Facts of the case
Mr Kankanalaplli accepted a position as Project Manager from Loesche Energy Systems, upon meeting the conditions of obtaining satisfactory references, providing right to work documents and completing a six-month probationary period. The agreed start date between the parties was the 1 November 2022. Mr Kankanalaplli provided his references on the 2 October 2022 and submitted right to work documents on 6 October 2022.
After making arrangements to start on 1 November, including booking flights for his family and making other plans to relocate, Loesche delayed his employed to start in January 2023. Days later, Loesche emailed Mr Kankanalaplli to say that they would no longer be able offer a contract of employment for a Project Manager.
Mr Kankanalaplli brought a claim to the Employment Tribunal as a result.
Tribunal ruling
The Employment Tribunal originally dismissed the claim, stating that the three conditions of employment had not been met, therefore ruling that there was no contract and as a result, no binding obligations arose from this.
Mr Kankanalaplli then appealed the decision to the Employment Appeals Tribunal (EAT). The EAT disagreed with the Employment Tribunals’ decision, holding that the initial tribunal hadn’t considered that the conditions were subsequent to the job offer, not precedent to the offer, highlighting that a contract did exist, and could have been terminated later if the conditions were not met. The EAT held that even if the conditions were precedent to the offer, that Loesche still had a duty not to withdraw the offer of employment prematurely before Mr Kankanalaplli could provide those conditions.
As a result, the EAT ordered Loesche to pay Mr Kankanalaplli the sum of three months’ notice.
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