The sales manager of BMW dealership near Harrogate was unfairly dismissed after selling a car against money laundering guidance, a tribunal has found.

James Dent was employed as head of sales at Stratstone BMW in Pannal until last September, when he was dismissed without notice from his job.

It followed the sale of a vehicle on September 1, which a tribunal in Leeds heard was one of the busiest trading days of the year, when new registrations were released.

A report from the tribunal, published yesterday, found Mr Dent had been asked not to hand over a new car to a customer on the “red list”, which indicated a third party was paying for the vehicle.

The list had been compiled after the company was contacted by police the previous day in relation to another buyer who was involved in criminal activity.

The tribunal was told a third-party funder was also seen as a risk for re-sale – when another garage which sells the car on at an inflated price. If the Harrogate dealership was found to have sold in these circumstances, it could lose its franchise with BMW and Mini, the hearing was told.

After an investigation, Mr Dent was told by Stratstone’s national franchise director for BMW and Mini, Anthony Partington, in a letter dated September 16, that he had been dismissed.

In the tribunal report, Judge Knowles wrote:

“The letter is effectively dismissal for decisions which place the respondent at risk of being knowingly involved with money laundering and also knowingly selling to resellers, exposing the franchise to possible penalties and his inability to follow a simple instruction from his regional director.”

The court heard Mr Dent had argued he was following a similar sale he had witnessed, when the regional sales director had effectively sold a car to a third party against company policy.

However, the tribunal found there were some differences between the two cases, including that the third party paying for the car was present during the transaction, though someone else collected the keys.

In his case, Mr Dent had not sought approval from a senior director before handing over the keys to someone when a third party, who was not present, was paying for the car.

‘Grave mistake’

Judge Knowles wrote:

“The claimant did not underestimate that he had done something seriously wrong. He described it as a wrong judgment on something that was high priority. He acknowledged that he overlooked the fact that they were not delivering the car to the paying customer.

“The claimant’s concluding comments were ‘I’d like to make it plain that I have not set out to deliberately contravene the company’s policy or risk myself or the company. I have made a grave mistake… but I’ve had a busy stressful day and I’ve made a poor judgement in the heat of the moment’.

“The claimant explained some circumstances in mitigation, that he had been busy that day, and that he had dealt with an extremely aggressive customer earlier who had been unhappy with the cleanliness of his new vehicle. He says his mind was elsewhere.”

The judge found there was no dispute between Mr Dent or his employer over whether the transaction had taken place on September 1.

However, what was disputed was the way in which the investigation was carried out.

Mr Partington’s letter made reference to other matters coming to light which showed “huge potential risk” to Stratstone, a trading name of Pendragon PLC.

Judge Knowles found these other matters had not been shared with Mr Dent during the disciplinary process and were not detailed in the dismissal letter.

‘Conscious decision’

In the letter, Mr Partington concluded:

“Finally, I can clearly see in the hearing, and throughout the relationship I have had with you, that the decisions made here are very unlikely to have been made for personal gain, or to knowingly de-fraud or compromise the business.

“Your attitude and approach has always proved to be professional and your commitment to the business is clear.”

Yet when Mr Dent appealed the decision and was unsuccessful, he was found to have “made a conscious decision to not follow clear instruction from your leader, and allowed the business to be put at risk by acting above your authority”.

The tribunal report also found the investigation into the regional sales director’s transaction, cited by Mr Dent as another example of a similar sale, had not been fully investigated.

Leeds Employment Tribunal at City Exchange in Leeds City Centre

Mr Dent said the real reason for his dismissal was because of the risk to the Harrogate garage of being known to have sold cars that were being paid for by third parties.

However, in response Stratstone BMW told the tribunal Mr Dent had been fully aware of the risk of releasing the car to the man in question, having helped to identify potential suspect transactions for that day.

The company said Mr Dent “acted contrary to clear management instructions” not to release the car, and accepted doing so warranted “some level of disciplinary action”, even dismissal.

Judge Knowles agreed that Mr Dent had handed the car over in contravention of the instructions he had been given.

Yet the report also found there was no evidence this was “deliberate” and that this had only been suggested following his appeal rather than as part of the disciplinary process.

It also found the “wider issues” had only been mentioned after the appeal, in the letter confirming Mr Dent’s dismissal, and no such issues had been put to him.

‘Hurdles to be cleared’

Concluding, Judge Knowles said that while the process of the dismissal had been unfair, Mr Dent’s actions meant he had been “wholly to blame for his dismissal”.

The judge therefore found Mr Dent had been unfairly dismissed, but had not been wrongly dismissed, and was not due any compensation in lieu of notice.

The report also said:

“Worryingly the anti-money laundering and counter terrorist financing policy and related security processes seem to have been treated by both [Mr Dent] and the [regional sales director] simply as hurdles to be cleared. This makes the policy somewhat of a false dawn.

“I suspect that this… will be an uncomfortable read for the board and its audit and risk sub-committee who have clearly sponsored and approved the policy.”

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A former employee of a Ripon car parts company has had his claim of unfair dismissal rejected by a tribunal.

Alliance Automotive‘s Ripon branch — which trades as Ripon Auto Spares — faced the accusation, along with one of breach of contract, from C Seaman, who was dismissed as a driver on May 4 last year.

It followed an incident on April 21, 2021, when he was alleged to have used an offensive racial term in the presence of a black colleague.

The Ripon branch manager investigated the accusation and suspended Mr Seaman on full pay the following day, under the instruction of area manager Roger Bailey.

The report from Leeds Employment Tribunal said:

“Mr Bailey conducted a disciplinary hearing on May 4, 2021, in which the claimant confirmed he used the word ‘n*****’, maintaining that its use was appropriate, because he said it related to a conversation with colleagues about an incident involving a black person in America.

“The claimant said he did not understand how anybody could be offended by the use of that word.”

Finding the conduct to amount to racial harassment, and that Mr Seaman showed no remorse, Mr Bailey dismissed him.

After an unsuccessful appeal through the company, Mr Seaman took Alliance Automotive to an employment tribunal, which was held in Leeds on April 12 and 13 this year. However, it has also rejected his claims of unfair dismissal and breach of contract.

Leeds Employment Tribunal, in City Exchange

In his report, published this week, Judge Jeremy Shulman said:

“During the disciplinary process the claimant sought to encourage the respondent [Alliance Automotive] to view a programme known as The Wire for justification of his use of the word ‘n*****’.

“The respondent decided the use of the word ‘n*****’ itself was sufficiently offensive, regardless of The Wire and we find that that programme was discussed during the disciplinary process. The programme apparently relates to the location of Baltimore on the subject of drug trafficking and policing.

“Very late in the proceedings the claimant produced a mitigation document. That contained 15 names, including the name of the Prime Minister, and the document contained no explanation whatsoever as to what it was and the claimant subsequently described it as irrelevant.”

The judge said Mr Seaman had received a code of conduct from his employer and had received training on it, including information about equality and diversity.

However, he said he had not read the information given to him because it was “not relevant”.

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The tribunal heard Mr Seaman had repeated the offensive term, but had claimed it was “just a black person” and that the term was widely used in films and by the black community. He said “race discrimination never even existed and everybody was treated equally” in his world.

Mr Shulman rejected the claims of unfair dismissal and breach of contract, and found Mr Seaman had been dismissed because of his conduct. He added:

“It was clear to me during the hearing that this was conduct the nature of which the claimant did not understand when everybody around him clearly did.

“He had some source materials which he never bothered to read and sought to justify his conduct by reference to names on a sheet of paper and an American television programme. None of this did anything to make an already serious position better.”

The judge ordered that the £300 deposit paid by Mr Seaman for the tribunal, in recognition of his low chances of success, be paid to his former employer.

An employment tribunal has ruled that a Knaresborough woman was unfairly treated when she was dismissed from her job for refusing to wear a face mask.

Laura Convery worked at the Volkswagen dealership in Knaresborough from July 2019 until October 2020.

Staff at the dealership were sent an email in May 2020 by British Street Fourth Investments Ltd, which owns the dealership, about a return to work and to follow a covid policy in which they were asked to wear masks and social distance.

The tribunal, which was held in Leeds, heard that Ms Convery had refused to wear a face mask because it gave her “panic attacks” and anxiety.

She said she had tried to wear a face covering in supermarkets when the government made them mandatory, but it caused her “severe distress”.

The company offered her the chance to wear a visor instead, but she declined. This led her line manager, Matt Brodgen, to suspend her.

Ms Convery later told Mr Brogden, in a text message in September 2020:

“I physically cannot wear one [a face covering], I have tried on more than one occasion since July 24 and I just can’t do it.

“It creates severe distress for a number of reasons. The main one being that I have a complete aversion to anything covering my face, which stems back from my teenage years I believe.

“I wasn’t aware that this was even a problem until I have tried to wear a face covering in recent months, but it transpires that it is a huge problem for me.”

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Ms Convery was invited to a disciplinary meeting the following October, but said she did not attend after increased stress and anxiety had led to her to being signed off work by her GP.

The dealership terminated her employment with immediate effect on October 15.

Anxiety impairment

However, the tribunal found that Ms Convery had been unfairly treated in her dismissal because “of something arising in consequence of her disability in contravention of section 15 of the Equality Act 2010”.

A judgement published by the tribunal concluded that she was “unable to wear a face covering because of her anxiety impairment”.

The tribunal also found that the company could not have known about Ms Convery’s disability before her text message in September.

However, it added:

“The respondent, the tribunal concludes, ought reasonably to have made further enquiries whether through its occupational health service provider or directly to the claimants own GP from which it is likely it would have become aware of the claimant’s disabling condition.”