Constructive Dismissal UK: Claims & Tribunal Guide

Overview

Constructive dismissal is a claim an employee can bring when they have resigned because of their employer's behaviour, arguing that the resignation should be treated in law as a dismissal. The legal hook sits in section 95(1)(c) of the Employment Rights Act 1996, which allows an employee to terminate the contract without notice where the employer's conduct entitles them to do so.

In plain terms, the employer must have done something serious enough to amount to a fundamental breach of the employment contract, often described as a repudiatory breach. The employee then has to resign in response to that breach, and without waiting so long that they appear to have accepted the new state of affairs.

Most claims rely on the implied term of mutual trust and confidence, which sits in every employment contract even where it is not written down. When an employer behaves in a way that destroys or seriously damages that trust, without reasonable and proper cause, the employee may be entitled to walk away and pursue a claim through the Employment Tribunal. It is not a route to take lightly, and not every difficult workplace situation will meet the legal threshold.

Key steps

1. Identify the breach clearly. Before resigning, work out exactly what your employer has done that you say breaches your contract. Vague unhappiness is not enough. You need a concrete act or pattern of behaviour, whether that is a sudden unilateral pay cut, a demotion with no contractual basis, sustained bullying that HR has failed to address, or a fundamental change imposed on your role. Write it down with dates.
2. Raise a formal grievance first. In almost every case you should put your complaint in writing through your employer's grievance procedure before resigning. Tribunals expect to see that you gave the employer a genuine chance to fix things, and failure to follow the Acas Code of Practice on disciplinary and grievance procedures can reduce any compensation you are awarded by up to 25 percent.
3. Do not delay your resignation. Once the breach has occurred and the grievance process has run its course, you need to act reasonably promptly. Staying on for months while continuing to accept wages can be treated as affirming the contract, which effectively waives the breach. Resigning too quickly without raising concerns carries its own risks, so the timing needs careful thought.
4. Resign and state your reasons in writing. Your resignation letter should make clear that you are treating the employer's conduct as a fundamental breach and that you are resigning in response to it. You can choose whether to resign with or without notice, but the letter needs to tie the resignation to the breach, not to unrelated reasons like a new job offer.
5. Start Acas early conciliation within three months. Before you can issue a tribunal claim you must notify Acas and go through early conciliation. The overall deadline for lodging a constructive unfair dismissal claim is strict: generally three months less one day from the effective date of termination. Miss it, and the tribunal will usually have no power to hear your case.