EDA2627

PARTIES:

DIVISION:

SUBJECT:

Appeal of Adjudication Officer Decision No's: ADJ-00044019 (CA-00054570-006)

BACKGROUND:

The Worker appealed the decision of the WRC Adjudication Officer under Section 83 (1), Employment Equality Acts, 1998 to 2015 on 18 September 2024.

A Labour Court hearing took place on 3 June 2026.

The following is the Determination of the Court:

DETERMINATION:

Background to the Appeal

This is an appeal by Ms Mary McCarthy (‘the Complainant’) from a decision of an Adjudication Officer (ADJ-00044019, dated 28 August 2024) under the Employment Equality Act 1998 (‘the Act’). Notice of Appeal was received in the Court on 18 September 2024. The Court heard the appeal in Dublin on 3 June 2026.

The Complaint

The Complainant’s substantive complaint is one of discrimination on the disability ground arising from the alleged failure of Boots Retail Ireland Limited (‘the Respondent’) to make reasonable accommodation for her stated disability.

Decision at First Instance

The Adjudication Officer declined jurisdiction to consider the Complainant’s substantive complaint having found that the complaint had been presented outside of the statutory timeframe for doing so and, in his opinion, the Complainant had not established reasonable cause to explain the delay.

Cognisable Period

The within complaint was received by the Workplace Relations Commission on 17 January 2023. The relevant period, therefore, for consideration in assessing a contravention of the Act is 18 July 2022 to 17 January 2023.

Submissions

It is submitted on behalf of the Complainant that, as a lay person with no prior experience of doing so, she found the task of completing and submitting her online complaint form to the Workplace Relations Commission confusing particularly in light of the fact that she had listed a number of individual complaints and had mistakenly believed that dates referenced in respect of one complaint had carried over to others.  She also submitted that she had specifically made reference, in the narrative section of her complaint form, to two dates (3 August 2022 and 25 October 2022) that fell within the cognisable period. Her submission is that she attended appeal meetings on those dates and experienced discriminatory treatment in that context.

It is submitted on behalf of the Respondent that the Complainant’s narrative in the complaint form as submitted to the Workplace Relations Commission specifically refers to alleged discrimination having occurred during a number of interactions between the Complainant and members of the Respondent’s management team on dates that fell outside the cognisable period. It is accepted that she did refer in the complaint form to events that occurred on 3 August 2022 and 25 October 2022 but did not expressly state that she was alleging discrimination had occurred on those dates. It was also submitted on behalf of the Respondent that in correspondence with the Workplace Relations Commission dated 22 February 2023, the Complainant identified 30 June 2022 as the most recent date on which she had been discriminated against by the Respondent.

Discussion and Decision

Having carefully considered the Parties’ submissions on the jurisdictional issue, the Court finds that the Complainant does have a stateable case that she was discriminated against during the cognisable period. The Court further finds that the Adjudication Officer placed undue emphasis on the completed complaint form and the correspondence between the Complainant and the Workplace Relations Commission in February 2023.

Having regard to the foregoing, the Court remits the within complaint to the Workplace Relations Commission for a full hearing of the Complainant’s substantive complaint of discrimination on the disability ground.

The Court so determines.

	Signed on behalf of the Labour Court
	Alan Haugh
FC	______________________
29/06/2026	Deputy Chairman

NOTE

Enquiries concerning this Determination should be in writing and addressed to Ms Fiona Corcoran, Court Secretary.