Caution over drop in employment tribunal claims

Employment lawyers have reacted cautiously to new figures from the Ministry of Justice suggesting that the number of employment tribunal claims fell to only 1,000 last month, a quarter of the usual monthly amount.

The MoJ's provisional figures show there were nearly 40,000 new claims from July to September 2013, in line with previous quarters.

However, the number of single cases surged from 4,000 in June this year to nearly 7,000 in July, as claimants rushed to beat the introduction of fees on 29 July. After this it fell sharply in August, before crashing to only 1,000 in September.

Laurie Anstis, solicitor at Boyes Turner in Reading, said there was "no doubt" that there was a surge of claims before fees came in and a drop-off afterwards.

However, he said it would not be until November that the "true picture" of the impact of fees on tribunal claims became clear.

"You have three months to bring an employment tribunal claim. If you were fired in August, it would make sense to negotiate with your employer and only then bring a claim.

"People are more likely to leave it to the last minute. Nobody wants to pay fees unless they have to.

"The figure for September does not include claims where applications for fee remission have been made, but not decided."

Anstis said that since many claimants had lost their jobs, significant numbers were entitled to fee remissions, possibly as many as half.

He added that even if the September figure was revised upwards to double the current amount, it would still be lower than any previous month.

Rob Riley, partner at Addleshaw Goddard in Leeds, agreed there had been an increase in claims before fees came in and a drop-off afterwards.

"You can't completely trust the statistics," he said. "There are claims in the system that are only now just coming through. There probably has been a drop, but not as big as the current statistics suggest."

He added that claims were taking longer to process, with more time being spent on sifting and a lack of clarity over who was required to pay fees.

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