Hopefully this will be a very hard lesson learned for him. Thankfully his boss was good enough to go easy on the plonker. Thanks for all your advice

Very annoying! I am just glad I did not go in gung ho! I would have looked a right fool!

Hi All. Turns out that it was a culmination of things over the last few months and they have in fact been very lenient with him. They are having a mutual parting of ways with pay in lieu of notice and a good reference. Thankfully I went in there open minded and listened to what they wanted to say and I am glad I did. He is now in a lot of trouble! Thanks for all your advice and helping put a good perspective on this.

Thank you and again thank you for your help it is very appreciated

Agreed. He is better off away from these people that have an agenda to remove him from the company. We found an advert for his job today that they have posted as an apprenticeship back in June for less than half his wage. Perhaps the reason they are doing this is because they are cutting costs. The biggest smack in the face is that the person doing this to him was a family friend before all this and had been for 15 years. Leaves a sour taste in the mouth how he is going about it.

Very true. We will get tomorrow over and done with and then take it from there. The more errors on their part the better from our point of view. Thanks again for helping calm the rage and provide rationale

Thank you both for your replies. It is pretty much we just go in tomorrow and he gives his responses. I will then let them know they may be looking at wrongful dismissal so if they want it over with fast they can agree a mutual settlement and he will sign a waiver. They can either be full of rage and not care or they can accept it and get it over with and avoid the appeal and the grievance which we will put in. I will let you know how it goes tomorrow. Thanks

The aim is to get a mutual agreement and neutral reference. They haven't given him a proper opportunity to defend himself as they haven't responded to his requests for policies and also not given clarity as to what the fabrication allegation is. Their policy states that he will be given the opportunity to respond to the allegations and that if he requires further information to ask within a reasonable timescale. Surely their failure to respond is not following the policy they have in place? The appeal is going to be fun. If they do not take reasonable steps during investigation like making contact with the police to ask if he has made a statement then that would mean they have not performed a proper investigation? Thanks

Ok so the best thing to do is await their decision and if they claim that these are proven facts we are then looking at a different case as it will then be no longer allegation but what they claim to be fact. Thanks

Ok so now we know the contract is dated for 2017 and not signed by both parties is it advisable to go in there and tell them the relationship is broken for both parties and to save time and money it is best for both parties to agree a mutually acceptable parting of ways with a waiver signed that he will not take any further action with regard to the comments in writing and signed by the manager which could be construed as defamation of character? Or should we take a different approach and say - the contract is not valid therefore there are no breaches of contract as the contract hasn't been agreed. Thanks

Haha!!! That is the most I have laughed for ages

Just checking over the contract of employment - he has not signed the contract nor has his employer and the commencement date is September 2017.

Hi, Thanks for the responses. So far he has still had nothing back from the manager with regard to the request for more clarification on what the fabrication of information allegation is so he can prepare his response. He has made reasonable requests for information from them but they have failed to send this and it is highly likely that they will not send this. I will be going in with him to support him - they have agreed to this - should we before things start just say - it is pretty evident your intentions are to remove him from your company and we are happy to reach a mutual agreement or you could go through this process and waste numerous man hours and potentially have to visit court. Or should we go in and let them go through this process and then let him give his responses then make the offer to settle it that day mutually. Either way he doesn't want to work for them going forward now as he trusted them and they acted like friends - naive on his part really given they are his bosses - and the working relationship is now gone. It says in their disciplinary policy and procedure that they have a capability process - some of these allegations I feel would fall in to the capability category? It has stated in the letter he has the right to accompanied yes. When he asked if a family member could attend with him they advised they would need to check with their legal department and then came back with - yes don't come in at 9am come in at 10am. I have told him that going off with stress is not the way forward and he has agreed that he won't be doing this. Thanks for the help so far it is appreciated.

In preparation for Monday does anybody know if they legally should have held an investigative interview first with him? It says in their disciplinary procedure they do do this but as it is they haven't and have gone gung ho straight to the disciplinary hearing. He has also advised that in May the colleague that told him to listen to music on his pc while working was given a bottle of expensive whiskey by the boss and a card but for his birthday he got a mumbled happy birthday and nothing else. Clutching at straws but could this be construed as victimisation potentially? Thanks

Hi, Thanks for the responses so far. Below are his responses to the allegations made by the employer - You failed to turn up for work until 11.30am on Wednesday 14th of July and you did not notify me or anyone else of your absence - Response - I tried to call you on your mobile phone before 8am but it was off with no voicemail option. When I attended the doctors at 8am to have my stitches removed from my nose due to the assault that I had happen to me I was unable to call you again due to my phone battery dying. I did send you an email as soon as I was in the office apologising and letting you know when I would be working the hours back - You did not respond to my email but I still worked the time back. You were asleep at your desk when I came in to the office on Thursday 15th of July - Response - I wasn't asleep I was leaning on my left forearm as I use my right hand to write. As soon as you entered the office I greeted you and instantly asked you if you would like a drink to which you declined. You did not challenge me at all to ask if I were asleep or tell me you thought I were asleep as I was not asleep. I understand that following an alleged assault on you last week you took money from the assailant in return for withdrawing a statement to the police. You were then seen counting rolls of cash at your desk during working hours. (He was assaulted outside of the work place - at the weekend and nothing to do with work and the lad that did it offered a good will gesture of £200 if he didn't go to the police as he was on bail at the time of the assault. No proof of cash changing hands as he has done nothing and left it to the police - the money he had was his birthday money which was the day before this alleged incident which he was counting during his dinner break at his desk) Response - Yes I was assaulted as you know. I previously spoke to you in general conversation about how the lad that did it had offered me money not to go to the police as he was already in trouble and on bail. I did not tell you I had accepted nor intended to accept any money from this person. I reported the matter to the police and they are dealing with it. I have not had any money from this person. The money I was counting was my birthday money which was £200 which I received from my family members on my birthday on the 16th of July. I was at my desk and it was 12.05pm which was my lunch time. I fail to see how this has anything to do with the company especially as the assault took place at the weekend outside of my working hours and I was not the aggressor. You have on numerous occasions fabricated information which has led to various problems including invoices being unpaid Response - Your allegation is very vague and shows little substance. Please provide more information as to what it is that I have done to fabricate information. I have printed copies of emails here to prove I have done what has been asked and what I have been trained to do with the invoices. (We are currently awaiting a response as to what the details are of the allegation) I have previously spoken to you about comments you made to blah blah (former co - worker left the business 3 months ago) that were deemed inappropriate Response - This was banter between myself and my colleague who I got on with and the comments were returned by the colleague to myself. You spoke to us both at the time informally as per the companies disciplinary procedure this matter was dealt with and the comments you made us aware of stopped from this point on. I would request you remove this allegation from the hearing as it is no longer relevant having already been dealt with. You have been seen on numerous occasions visiting non business websites during working hours. In particular you were warned about this on 29th of April and 05th of May Response - The only time you have spoken to me about this is when you handed me the disciplinary letter. You told me I had been seen using a music website to listen to music. I had been using music websites while doing my work yes. I have been doing this since my colleague blah blah informed me that he did this as it helped him focus and get his work completed and he then showed me how best to do this. He still continues to do this and has no action taken against him. When blah blah (another manager) came in to the office one day she asked what is that and responded with an honest answer of what it was which was a music site - she did not say anything else and did not challenge this nor ask it to stop at all at this point. He has emailed the manager dealing with this asking for the training policy, code of conduct and also the lone worker policy (this has been requested as he has been left alone in the office for weeks at a time with no call from anybody to ask if he is ok and make sure he is ok to open up the building and also lock up at night. So far we have had no response other than to tell him not to go to work at 9am and just to turn up at 10am for the hearing. He has asked if he will get paid still from 9am and again no response. He has also advised that as he hasn't had full details of the allegations with dates and times and more detail around the fabrication of information allegation that he would like to request the hearing be postponed to allow him time to review what they have (when they send it) and produce a response - again no response as yet. He has been told by another family member to go to the doctors and get signed off with stress Monday and try to delay the hearing...my thoughts are that this is bad advice! Thanks