This article is general information, not legal advice. Every case is examined on its own facts, and every cause of action has its own limitation period.

The email arrived on Wednesday afternoon, under the subject line "Invitation to a hearing". The meeting was set for Thursday at nine. The message is two lines long. It does not say what the allegations are. One night separates the date it was sent from the time of the meeting, and that email is usually the first document our firm asks to see when someone rings to say they have been dismissed. The duty to hold a hearing before dismissal was established by the Labour Court, and it applies to almost every employer. Whether it was honoured is decided, more often than not, by what is written on three documents.

A duty not written in any one statute

The duty to hold a hearing appears in no single statute. The Labour Court developed it out of the principle of good faith and the duty of fairness in employment relations, first in the public sector and later for private employers as well. The employer must hear the employee before the decision is closed, and must weigh what was said. That is the whole rule. Proving that it happened is harder, because weighing something with an open mind takes place inside someone else's head, and the court learns about it from what was left on paper, which is sometimes a single line in the minutes: "the employee responded to the allegations", without what the response was.

Three documents, three dates

When an employee claims to have been dismissed without a hearing, or after a defective one, the court asks more than one question, and most of the answers are written on three documents. The first is the summons: whether it was in writing, whether it set out the allegations against the employee, and how much time passed between it and the meeting. A summons that says "we would like to discuss your continued employment" without saying what about leaves no way to prepare, to look at the documents, or to arrive with a companion, a lawyer included. The second is the minutes of the hearing: who sat in the room, whether the person conducting it had the authority to decide, and what was recorded of the employee's answers. The third is the dismissal letter, and on it sits the date that matters most. A letter printed before the meeting says the decision had already been taken, and the court treats a hearing like that as if it had never been held. The same is learnt from a replacement hired before the meeting, and from a decision delivered without reasons.

A hearing is not a formality. The court asks whether, in that room, there was still a chance the decision would change.

The other side arrives with the same documents

The employer has an account of its own, and in most cases it rests on the same three documents. From that side of the table the usual account is that the employee knew perfectly well what the meeting was about, because conversations about performance had gone on for months, and that the letter already drafted was a draft prepared just in case. Sometimes that account holds. An employer that comes to court without minutes is left with the evidence of whoever conducted the hearing, who is usually also the person who decided. In other circumstances, when the summons was delivered days in advance with the allegations written out, and the minutes show questions asked and answers recorded, the employer arrives at the Labour Court with a process it can defend, and the employee's case rests on what happened after the meeting: how long passed before the letter, and whether the letter responds to what was said in the room or repeats the summons word for word.

Compensation for the process, separate from severance pay

The question of what it is worth usually reaches our firm before the question of whether there was a hearing at all. The usual remedy for breach of the duty to hold a hearing is financial compensation for unlawful dismissal. It is a separate remedy from severance pay and does not come out of it, so an employee who received severance pay in full can still sue over the process. The amount is set by the circumstances: how serious the defect was, the employee's seniority, how the dismissal was carried out, and the harm caused. A new employee whose hearing took place the day after the summons, and a long-serving one dismissed in a phone call, are not talking about the same sum. Nobody knows the figure in advance. Reinstatement is a remedy the court can order, but it is rare, and the claim is usually financial. Even when the reason for the dismissal stands up, because performance was poor and there were documents to show it, the defect in the process is examined separately, and compensation for it is awarded according to how serious the defect was.

What is left in hand the week after

By the end of the week in which the letter was delivered there is usually more evidence than it seems. The summons, even if it came by WhatsApp. The dismissal letter, and its date. The messages and emails from those days, including the one asking whether "tomorrow at nine works for you". The minutes, if any were kept, and if not, a written request for them together with the reasons for the decision, which produces one more document: the reply, or its absence. Notes written in those same days, who sat in the room and what was said, are read by the court differently from notes written months later, once there is a case. Those days usually also bring a termination agreement, and sometimes a waiver. Do not sign before they have been checked. Every cause of action has its own limitation period, and time works against whoever waits. At our firm the examination starts by laying the three documents side by side and asking the first question they raise: what date is on the dismissal letter, and what date is on the summons?