Szepielow v NHS Tayside

A notice of appeal is validly instituted where it is substantially in accordance with the prescribed form. A postal address supplied elsewhere on the notice may satisfy the requirement for an address for service, even where the specific service-address box contains only an email address.

The question is whether the notice contains an address through which the appellant can be contacted and which meets the practical purposes of service, case administration and enforcement. The decision is confined to exceptional circumstances and does not excuse a failure to supply a postal address at all.

The appellant's Employment Tribunal claims for unfair dismissal and discrimination were dismissed. He lodged an appeal while on an extended voyage. His notice gave his home postal address in the section for his name and address, but gave only an email address in the section requesting an address for service.

Following correspondence and an unless order, the appeal was struck out. It was later reinstated, but the Registrar held that it had not been properly instituted until a postal address was supplied and was therefore out of time. The appellant appealed that order.

The central issue was whether the original notice had substantially complied with the requirements for instituting an appeal.

1. Appeal allowed. The original notice of appeal was properly instituted within time. The Registrar had erred in treating the absence of a postal address in the designated service-address box as necessarily invalidating it.

2. Rule 3(1)(a) of the Employment Appeal Tribunal Rules permits a notice which is substantially in accordance with Form 1. That qualification required attention to the substance and purpose of the information supplied, rather than to the location of every item on the form.

3. A postal address for service serves important purposes. It enables contact by the Tribunal and parties, supports efficient administration and arrangements for hearings, and permits enforcement of an adverse costs order. The appellant had supplied a complete home address with postcode, confirmed that it was his home address, and thereby supplied an address capable of meeting those purposes.

4. The notice therefore substantially complied with Form 1. The fact that the appellant entered an email address, rather than repeating the postal address, in the service-address box did not negate the information already provided. The President stressed that this was an exceptional conclusion and was unlikely to set a wider precedent.

5. The appellant's conduct in failing to comply with subsequent directions was poor. Had the outcome depended on the unless order, the appeal would have remained struck out unless that order were set aside. But an extension of time was unnecessary because the appeal had been validly instituted in March 2014. The underlying appeal was to proceed only to the initial Rule 3 sift on the papers.

• Employment Appeal Tribunal: appeal from the Registrar's order of 26 March 2015 allowed. The appeal was held to have been properly instituted and was to proceed to an initial sift under Rule 3.
• Employment Tribunal: the appellant's claims for unfair dismissal and sex, race and age discrimination were dismissed in a determination dated 4 February 2014.