UDD2630

PARTIES:

DIVISION:

SUBJECT:

Appeal of Adjudication Officer Decision No.: ADJ--00055747 (CA-00067781-001)

BACKGROUND:

The Worker appealed the Decision of the Adjudication Officer to the Labour Court on 02 June 2025 in accordance with Section 8A of the Unfair Dismissals Act 1977 to 2015. A Labour Court hearing took place on 04 August 2026.

The following is the Decision of the Court:-

DECISION:

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1 Background to the Appeal

This is an appeal by Ms Oonagh McCartney (‘the Complainant’) from a decision of an Adjudication Officer (ADJ-00055747, dated 1 May 2025) under the Unfair Dismissals Act 1977 (‘the Act’). The Adjudication Officer declined jurisdiction having found that the complaint under the Act had been referred out of time. Notice of Appeal was received in the Court on 2 June 2025. The Court heard the appeal in Dublin on 4 August 2026.

2 Brief Factual Background

The Complainant was employed as a cleaning operative by Grosvenor Services Limited (‘the Respondent’) from 27 June 2019 until she resigned her employment in May 2024. On 30 May 2024, the Complainant wrote as follows to the Respondent:

“Dear Joe,

I am writing to formally resign from my position as Cleaner with Grosvenor services, effective immediately as of 30th May 2024. This decision arises in response to a repudiatory breach of my employment contract by Grosvenor … I now consider my position at Grosvenor is untenable, and my working conditions intolerable.

Given the gravity of these circumstances, I have no choice but to pursue this matter further. Accordingly, I will be lodging a complaint of constructive dismissal under the Unfair Dismissal (sic) Act and a complaint of penalisation under the Protected Disclosures Act.

……”

3 Preliminary Issue

At the commencement of the within hearing, the Complainant confirmed to the Court that she had submitted her resignation in writing to the Respondent on 30 May 2024 and that she had referred her complaint under the Act to the Workplace Relations Commission on 30 November 2024. When referring her complaint form, the Complainant expressly stated that her employment with the Respondent had ceased on 30 May 2024.

The Complainant accepted that her complaint had, therefore, been received six months and one day after she had submitted her resignation. She told the Court that the Respondent had asked her to reconsider her resignation and had given her until 3 June 2024 to do so. She also told the Court that she confirmed her resignation on 31 May 2024. The Complainant submitted that on that basis the Court should deem her resignation to have been made on 31 May 2024. Asked if she had any legal authority to support her submission, the Complainant declined to provide any such authority to the Court.

The Complainant was asked by the Court for an explanation as to why she had stated on her complaint form that her employment had ceased on 30 May 2024 but now sought to maintain that it had in fact not ceased until the following day when she ‘confirmed’ her resignation. She said that when the Workplace Relations Commission received her complaint form it had notified her that her complaint appeared to be out of time. It was at that point in time that she formed the view, she said, that she had made an error when completing the complaint form

4 Discussion and Decision

When submitting her resignation to the Respondent on 30 May 2024, the Complainant stated that her resignation was ‘effective immediately as of 30th May 2024’. Those words are unequivocal in their meaning. The date on which such a resignation takes effect, as a matter of law, is the date on which it is received by the recipient employer.

It is a fact that the Respondent received the Complainant’s notice of resignation on the date on which it was sent as the Respondent replied that very day to express regret at having received the notice and proposed to give the Complainant time to reconsider her decision. The Complainant replied the following day to say that “I am writing to confirm that I am moving forward with my resignation, as detailed in my email yesterday.”

In the Court’s view, there is only one inference that can be drawn from the Complainant’s email of 31 May 2024

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which is that she wished to confirm the terms of the resignation she had proffered the previous day i.e. a resignation that had immediate effect from 30 May 2024.

Having regard to the foregoing, the Court finds that the Complainant as a matter of fact and law resigned her employment on 30 May 2024. It follows that the subsequent complaint received by the Workplace Relations Commission on 30 November 2024 was received one day outside of the statutory time limit.

The appeal, accordingly, fails and the decision of the Adjudication Officer is affirmed.

The Court so decides.

	Signed on behalf of the Labour Court
	Alan Haugh
AL	______________________
07/08/2026	Deputy Chairman

NOTE

Enquiries concerning this Decision should be addressed to Ms Amy Leonard, Court Secretary.

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