Alfonso Catering Meats Ltd, which runs a café in the northern St Helier area, claims that it lost hundreds of pounds as a result of Vitalina Teixeira’s absence in August and deducted two weeks’ worth of wages out of her final pay cheque as a result.
But in December, the worker took the firm to an Employment and Discrimination Tribunal, in an attempt to claim back the money. However, she was unsuccessful and the panel’s deputy chairman Fraser Roberts ruled that the business had not been ‘excessive’.
According to a judgment, issues first arose when, in August, the claimant was asked to work a ten-hour split shift.
However, Ms Teixeira, the judgment said, was ‘not happy’ with this and asked the company’s secretary, Maria Luiz, why someone else could not do it.
Eventually, following a heated argument, Ms Luiz agreed to work the morning shift before Ms Teixeira took over at 2pm.
However, she did not turn up and nothing was heard from her until 8.11pm when she sent a text saying that she was not going to work for Alfonso anymore but would visit the café the next day to pick up her wages.
According to the judgment, Ms Luiz claimed that because Ms Teixeira had not shown up for work, they had been understaffed and had to close their Cheapside café on Sunday and the following bank-holiday Monday. She added that this was the first time this had happened in the company’s 26-year history.
It added that a clause had been incorporated into the claimant’s contract allowing the company to withhold or deduct two weeks’ pay in the event of an employee leaving without giving notice.
And it added that the business had lost around £620 – equivalent to two weeks’ pay – during its unplanned closure.
Advocate Roberts eventually dismissed Ms Teixeira’s claim.
