In the case of E.ON Control Solutions Limited v Caspall, the Claimant attempted to bring a number of claims against the Respondent, the Claimant’s previous employer. The Claim Form wrongly stated the EC number for a different Claimant, who was also bringing claims against the Respondent and who was also represented by the same solicitors as the Claimant.
A Preliminary Hearing was convened in order to consider whether the Claimant’s claims should be allowed to proceed. The Employment Judge (EJ) noted that the claim had not been rejected and decided that it was open to the Claimant to apply to amend his claim to include the correct EC number. The EJ considered that there would be no prejudice to the Respondent in allowing the amendment and that the error could be easily corrected.
The Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) disagreed with the Employment Tribunal. It considered that having submitted a Claim Form with an inaccurate EC number, there was an obligation on the EJ to reject the claim and return the Claim form to the Claimant, explaining why it had been rejected and explaining how he could apply for a reconsideration. This did not happen but the EAT considered that this did not mean that the obligation to reject the claim ceased to apply. The EJ had a duty to reject the claim and had the EJ done so, there would no longer have been a claim before the Tribunal that could have been amended by the exercise of the EJ’s case management powers. The EJ therefore had erred in purporting to allow an amendment to a claim that ought to have been rejected.