If you are going to make a habit of representing others in the tribunals, learn to touch-type. That is, learn to type fluently, without looking at the keyboard, using all your fingers on the ‘correct’ keys.

This is hard advice to follow. If you’ve been using computers for a while, you’re probably quite fluent using 2 or 3 fingers on each hand and looking at the keyboard. You’ll never reach competent secretary speeds that way, but for lots of purposes – because it’s the thinking what to write that takes the time more than the writing – you don’t notice that your typing speed is slow. Once you’ve got to that point, it’s hard to learn to type properly – because although your final touch-typing speed will be a lot faster, while you learn you will have to slow right down to complete beginner speeds. That’s incredibly frustrating while it lasts.

All the same, it’s good advice. Learning the keyboard so that you can find each letter with the right finger without looking takes maybe 2 to 4 hours’ concentration. There are lots of free typing courses on the internet; you just have to pick one, and spend a few boring hours doing exercises. After that, it’s just a matter of practice to get your speed up – and forcing yourself to stick to touch-typing for all purposes, even while it slows you down. The more you drill yourself on exercises, the shorter that period will be.

With a bit of practice, you’ll be able to take something close to word-for-word notes of evidence during the hearing. That’s handy in any case; but in a long case, or a case that gets adjourned mid-way through it’s an enormous help; see laptops in the tribunal.

People sometimes feel that any letter they write must fall within a recognised category, and must not venture outside that area. In other words, if they want to request disclosure and deliver some witness statements they feel they should write two different letters.

This is probably the fault of people who write books including examples of letters neatly divided up.

The basic idea is good. It is best to separate out issues and deal with one thing at a time. There is, however, no need to write two letters. Just use headings to split up the different subjects.

The exception to this general rule is letters about settling the case. Since these are without prejudice they cannot be shown to the tribunal. This can become complicated if you need to rely on the part about witness statements. To avoid this problem it is better to send two letters.

But you can put them in the same envelope.

Email is a useful tool in litigation, and almost all professional representatives use it constantly. If you are a claimant you should consider using email for running your case.

The advantage is speed and convenience of communication. There is nothing you can do with email that you can’t do by post, just a bit more slowly. You can email the other side and the tribunal. The other side will probably email back, although the tribunals still tend to stick to letters. If you have instructed a representative email will be a useful way of keeping in touch with them.

But if you’re not already a regular user of email, it can create difficulties. Because email is so fast, people tend to expect replies to emails within minutes or hours rather than days or weeks. If you put an email address on your ET1 or use email to send messages, people will expect to be able to reach you by email. If you don’t check your email for several weeks – or even several days – the sender will think you are ignoring him. This will create frustration and confusion.

It is better not to have an email address at all unless you check it several times a week.

If you decide to set up an account, the simplest method is to use an online webmail service. If you are a computing snob, the best is probably Google Mail, but Yahoo and Hotmail offer similar services.

People sometimes worry about whether email is secure enough for confidential communications. Sending information over the internet and storing it on computers does raise questions about security. But there’s no reason to be more anxious about computer and internet security than the security of your telephone, fax and postal communications. If you’re worried about that, then either you’re paranoid or they really are out to get you; in the latter case you probably need some specialist security advice, not restricted to computer matters.

Our publisher has told us that they have run out of copies of Employment Tribunal Claims: Tactics and Precedents, the book that this site was created to accompany.

In one sense this is great news. It means that we’ve sold 1,800 copies since September 2007 – which would be disappointing for the latest adventures of a certain adolescent wizard, but is pretty decent for a law book. At the same time, it means people may be finding it hard to find a copy, which we like to think is a bad thing.

The book’s being reprinted, so this is a temporary problem. In the short term, copies are still available from amazon.co.uk.

If you follow that link (or the one at the side of the page) a small affilliate fee (about 5%) will be paid the Free Representation Unit, in addition to the royalties, which always benefit FRU.

If you have a copy, but have finished your tribunal, consider passing it on to someone who might find it useful.

ETA: The reprint has now been done, so you should have no trouble finding a copy from any normal source.

In the current economic situation, we are seeing a significant rise in the number of insolvent employers and a similar increase in employers claiming to be broke.

It is important to keep these two points separate, because most people do not use terms like ‘bankruptcy’ or ‘insolvency’ in a technical sense.

To a careful lawyer ‘bankruptcy’ means that an individual is the subject of a formal bankruptcy order by a court. ‘Insolvency’ has a wider definition, covering bankruptcy as well as the range of similar states that a company may find itself in, such as administration. The key point is that to be formally bankrupt or insolvent is an official legal state, usually created by a court order.

Many people, however, use these words to mean simply that they cannot pay their bills. Even more unfortunately, some people mean that they could pay their bills, but would rather not.

Fortunately, it is easy to find out what the official position is. For individuals the Insolvency Service operates the Individual Insolvency Register. For companies, you can check the Companies House online service.

Neither system can be absolutely up to date. But an insolvency will almost always be on record within a week. If an employer is claiming insolvency, but is not on the record, they should be able to produce the official documentation to demonstrate it.

When it comes to recovering money, the fact that a respondent is not insolvent does not mean funds will be available. For that matter, some or all money owed may be recoverable from an insolvent employer. But an important first step is to establish the official position.

It is always worth paying a bit of attention to the more obscure bits of the ET3 form.

This is the form the Claimant gets back from their employer, after they have sent their ET1 to the tribunal. It sets out the employer’s response (subject to their drafting skills).

It is easy to focus on Paragraph 5, which is the main section. This is important, but make sure you look at the other parts too. These will tell you, for example, whether they accept the claimant’s employment status and if they dispute her working hours.

If one of these, more peripheral, issues are going to be argued, it is important to realise that as soon as possible. And, if the employer has said that they are not, but later tries to go back on their statement, it is reasonable to point to the ET3 and ask why they have changed their position.

One of the things that will happen at a hearing is that you will be asked questions by the tribunal.

The best way of answering them is to be simple, concise and direct. In fact, this is really the only proper way of answering.

There are, however, any number of bad ways of answering. Here are some:

The Politician

Ms Smith, did you put your grievance in writing?

It was totally unreasonable the way they handled the problem. I never got invited to a meeting and nobody asked me about what had happened.

Any politician worth his salt knows that you don’t answer the question you were asked, you answer the one you’d like to have been asked.

This really doesn’t work in tribunals.

The Politician knows that his job is to get his message out to the public, regardless of the interviewer’s attempts to interfere. He doesn’t need or want, much less expect, to convince his interviewer of anything. He isn’t really talking to the interviewer at all.

In a hearing, you are trying to convince the tribunal of your case. You cannot do so by ducking their questions.

The Teenager

On a Monday morning in London Central…
Mr Smith, I’m surprised that this hasn’t been sorted out before this hearing. I see that an order was sent out some time ago.

Well, Sir, I’m afraid I was away when that letter arrived.

When did you first see it?

Last week.

When last week?

Monday

So you’ve know about it for 7 days?

It is a good general rule to deal with any bad news in a tribunal by getting it out and dealt with as quickly as possible. This is particularly true in the context of tribunal questions.

Everybody finds it annoying to receive evasive and partial answers to questions. And everybody finds it irritating to have to drag information out of someone piece by piece.

It is always worth assuming that your tribunal is clever and experienced. They have probably heard most, if not all, of the variations on the exchange above. And the Chair spent or spends his professional life cross-examining evasive witnesses. Partial and evasive answers will almost always be spotted for what they are.

The Boss

Mr Smith, can you tell us what you say about the s98A point?
I’ll be dealing with that point later in my submissions, Sir.

This is just counterproductive.

There are two reasons for this. Firstly, refusing to answer the question will probably annoy the tribunal. Nobody likes being ignored or rebuffed.

Secondly, if the tribunal is asking the question they are interested in the answer. It is much better to deal with the point while they are interested, rather than put them off.

It is also worth bearing in mind that the tribunal is in charge of the hearing. If they want to deal with a particular issue in a a particular way or at a particular time, then that is what will happen. Very occasionally it is worth fighting them (as politely as possible), but these situations are rare.

Non-lawyers tend to think of these as separate categories. You often hear something like “I wasn’t dismissed – I was made redundant.” But from the point of view of employment law, if you are made redundant, you have been dismissed. Redundancy is just one of a range of possible reasons for dismissal.

The reason it’s worth mentioning this mistake – especially in current circumstances – is that it could lead you to think that if you’ve been made redundant, you can’t complain of unfair dismissal. That would be wrong. If your employer has acted unfairly in selecting you for redundancy, you are entitled to complain to an employment tribunal about it.

Strictly speaking, if you are the claimant, it’s your case – so it’s your job to prepare the bundles for the hearing and provide copies for the other side and the tribunal. You’ll need 6 copies: 1 for you, 1 for your opponent, 3 for the tribunal, and 1 for the witness table.

In fact, bundles for the employment tribunals are probably more often prepared by the employer’s representatives. The reason for this is that in many cases, only the employer is represented by solicitors. Solicitors have fancy photocopiers and heavyweight hole-punches and people who are practised at preparing bundles, so it tends to be assumed that they should do it because it will be easier for them.

The main advantage in doing the bundles yourself is that it gives you control over when the job gets done – there’s no risk that you will only get your copy the day before the hearing and have a very short time to get to know it, mark it with highlighters, stick post-its on the most important pages etc. But if you trust the solicitors on the other side to do a competent job in reasonably good time, and they are willing to do it, you might as well let them.

You may be asked by the employment judge how long you think your cross-examination of a witness will take.

This is a difficult question, and the honest answer – even if you’re an old hand – is that you can make a guess, but you don’t really know. Some witnesses will answer very shortly, and others will treat every question as an excuse for a speech. A lot depends on how firm the tribunal is prepared to be with an evasive or woffly witness.

If you do – or are going to do – a lot of tribunal representation, you could adopt this useful habit. Include in your cross-examination notes an estimate of how long the cross examination will take. Then note the time at the beginning and end of your cross examination, and compare how long it actually took with how long you thought it would take. You’ll never rule out all uncertainty, but your estimates should gradually get more reliable.