A US video game company that told a senior FWC member "I wish the United States was as diligent as you guys" about unfair dismissals has been ordered to reinstate an Australian-based tester, after the tribunal applied the new "practical reality" test for employment relationships.
The FWC has banned a paid agent from continuing to represent his client after finding him to blame for the worker's late dismissal challenge and that he sought to rely on a decision which "clearly does not exist" when arguing the application had been filed within time.
The FWC has upheld the sacking of a nurse who "accidentally defibrillated" a patient, finding that she refused to take responsibility for the incident and rejecting claims her dismissal followed targeted bullying.
The FWC has upheld the sacking of a long-serving Woolworths warehouse worker who took almost 100 days off in the last year alone, finding the supermarket giant's leniency over many years did not preclude it from switching to a stricter approach.
An employer that owes a worker more than $9000 in unpaid wages constructively dismissed her by underpaying her and consistently failing to pay her on time, if at all, the FWC has ruled, ordering it to pay $27,425 compensation.
The FWC has criticised a government department's premature destruction of CCTV footage that might have revealed the truth about a sacked bus cleaner's alleged theft of a handbag left on board.
The FWC has awarded indemnity costs against an IT company for its vexatious defence of an unfair dismissal claim that included a HR consultant's "astonishing" approach to the worker's new employer to establish his earnings.
A union delegate's "at best negligent and at worst foolhardy" practice of filling in his timesheets inaccurately did not warrant his summary dismissal, because his employer failed to establish that he deliberately set out to deceive it, the FWC has found.
A worker who insisted on toiling from his hospital bed almost immediately after bowel surgery has failed to overturn his dismissal for repeatedly flouting a direction to work within ordinary hours.
The FWC has ordered compensation for an inexperienced FIFO mineworker sacked over her involvement in a dig site mix-up that cost her employer about $200,000 after the dumping of 54 ounces of gold.
