Employment e-Brief: Controversial decision on time limits in the Tribunal

In Grisanti v NBC News Worldwide Inc the Claimant discovered that no national insurance payments had been made on her behalf between 1996 and 2003. She lodged a breach of contract claim on 24 March 2015 which was far outside the 6 year limitation on contract claims, but within the three-month time limit from the termination of her employment (as extended by ACAS Conciliation).

The Employment Tribunal declined to follow a previous Tribunal decision of Taylor v Central Manchester University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and held that the purpose of the 1994 Order (which allows Tribunals to hear contract claims at all) was to extend jurisdiction and so it concluded that it had jurisdiction to hear the contract claim.

This decision will be persuasive but not binding on other Tribunals.

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