£25k tribunal | Worker returns from maternity leave to find office shut down

A worker has been awarded more than £25,000 after her employer shut down her office without informing her, leaving her to return from maternity leave to an empty building.

Anna Munkevics successfully brought claims of pregnancy and maternity discrimination, constructive and automatic unfair dismissal, breach of contract, and equal pay against Echo Personnel Ltd. 

An employment tribunal held in Birmingham found that the firm’s failure to honour a verbal agreement about her return-to-work hours, its decision to vacate her workplace without telling her, and the withholding of her notice pay amounted to unlawful treatment connected to her pregnancy.

Discriminated against after maternity leave

Munkevics began working for Echo Personnel Ltd in March 2021 as a recruitment consultant at the company’s Hereford office. She took maternity leave from May 2022 to April 2023. During her leave, she agreed with her line manager, Ben Diston, that she would return part-time for two days a week, four hours a day, before resuming full-time work after a couple of months.