KEY POINTS:
A heavy-equipment company has been ordered to pay an ex-employee more than $30,000, including $12,000 for injured feelings and loss of dignity.
The Employment Relations Authority found AB Equipment (ABE) sacked Rex Field for allegedly lying on his timesheets, without giving him a fair chance to defend himself.
Mr Field was working as a forklift technician for ABE in Palmerston North when he decided to visit a client's Feilding site on his way home from work on Friday, January 27.
On the following Monday, Mr Field filled in his timesheet to record that he had worked at the site from 4.30pm to 5.30pm on the Friday.
A week later, Mr Field was asked to attend a disciplinary meeting with his employers. He was told the meeting would deal with an allegation that he had falsified a timesheet.
ABE branch manager John Patterson told Mr Field at the meeting that according to the Feilding client's visitor log, he had not been there on the afternoon of January 27.
Mr Field insisted he had not falsified his timesheet, but he couldn't prove this because ABE had not told him before the meeting which date it was alleging he had lied about.
At a second meeting, after checking with the Feilding client again, Mr Patterson told Mr Field a decision had been reached about his employment.
He then asked Mr Field if he wanted to say anything, without telling him what the decision was.
Mr Field had nothing to say, and Mr Patterson told him he was fired.
After being fired, Mr Field went to the client's site and spoke to two workers who recalled his presence at the site on the day in question.
Because of an oversight, his name had not been written in the log.
At the Employment Relations authority hearing, Mr Patterson said although it turned out Mr Field had not lied about January 27, ABE management believed he had exaggerated his work hours for some time.
He was also aggressive and bullied a number of his colleagues, Mr Patterson claimed.
The authority said there was no evidence to support ABE's suspicion that Mr Smith had been overstating his timesheets, and its accusation that he bullied other staff was not enough to warrant sacking him.
The authority ordered ABE to pay Mr Field $18,929.86 for lost earnings between February and August 2006, and a further $12,000 for humiliation and hurt feelings.
- NZPA
