The law positively encourages business competition, but there are limits and judges are active in policing the line of acceptability. In one case, the owner of an independent bakery narrowly escaped being sent to prison for making illegitimate use of a much larger rival’s equipment.
Following a consultation, the Presidents of the Employment Tribunal have issued revised guidance on the amount of compensation payable for injury to feelings in discrimination cases (the ‘Vento’ bands).
At MrFinch, we pride ourselves on ensuring our clients are kept fully informed of legislative changes and are equipped to adapt their internal processes accordingly.
When a compensation award is made to the victim of an accident, the actual amount of the settlement is adjusted to take into account the interest the claimant can expect to earn by investing it. This is achieved by applying a ‘discount rate’, or ‘Ogden rate’ to the sum awarded. Traditionally, the percentage rate applied has been linked to returns on lowest-risk investments – typically index-linked gilts. The lower the rate, the higher the compensation award.
Aldi Stores Ltd have been fined £1 million and ordered to pay £70,000 in cost after a delivery driver who had only worked for the firm for two weeks suffered severe injuries to his foot while operating an electric pallet truck at one of its stores.
It is described, perversely, as a team-building exercise; it is reported that, as a forfeit for missing their weekly sales targets, staff at Central Claims Group – a call centre – in Bury are made to lie down on the floor while a good-sized squid is placed, or dropped, on their faces. It could be worse – it’s not a live squid, so it can’t sucker itself on to your mouth and nose, and it’s raw, so at least you know it hasn’t been overcooked.
Call centre turnover, employee churn, agent attrition – it’s a big issue for any business. The call centre industry in particular has typically higher turnover rates than businesses in other industries. Life as a call centre agent or customer service representative tends to come with an infamous reputation. Typically high-stress, low-paying, and repetitive work means it’s difficult for call centres to retain their staff.
Online platforms make it possible for almost anyone to have a flutter on the financial markets. However, web-based trading can be open to abuse and that was certainly so in one case concerning a retired teacher who made a profit of more than $460,000 in less than a minute.
The high seas may be wild and uncontrollable, but they are not lawless. In one case that proved the point, the High Court broke a commercial impasse that had left an oil tanker drifting at anchor thousands of miles from her home port for almost a year.
A global economy requires global consistency in legal decision-making and English judges are very reluctant to go behind the rulings of foreign courts – however much they may disagree with them. In one such case, the High Court refused to order enforcement of an arbitration award that had been overturned by a Russian judge.