6 month probation period

[Le Chat]

My friend's husband has been working for a well known telephone company on a 6 month probation period. During this time, he has secured a massive account and when the transation is completed in the next couple of months, he will have earned commission of �65 000 !!However, at his 6 month probationary evaluation, he was told that he wasn't up to scratch and that he had failed his presentation .(He had to give one to the board) Now my friend and her husband are sure that the company want rid because they want to avoid paying him his �65k commission.
If all she says is correct (and he wasn't a useless employee otherwise) do they have a leg to stand on, as he was in a probationary period?

[thebrainy123]

Well if he earnt the company that money, and was due 65k commission I do no think they have any right to get rid of him, although he is on probationary period, he should write to the directors stating his case ie his account which has 65k commission for him and state that he is obviously good at what he does,

if they do want to get rid of him however he should still get to keep his commission as he was the one who made the sale

really need to see a copy of his contract to advise further i work in recruitment and have been in recruitment for 20 years

[bednobs]

it depends on what they were looking at in the probationary period. If they were simply looking at how much work he could bring in, and he brought enough business in then on the face of it thats not a reason for getting rid of him. However, there is probably a whole host of other stuff they looked at. can he ask to see the criteria?

[grumpysod]

Your friend's husbands contract may say two things -
1. His continued employment shall be subject to a probationary period of service. If he proves unsatisfactory during that period, the employer should warn him and give him an opportunity to improve. However, the employee has a right to claim unfair dismissal, but only after a qualifying period of service of twelve months. Therefore after six months service, he has no rights to claim unfair dismissal.

2 The contract may say that he shall receive a payment by way of commission for bringing in business for the employer. That is a contract in which the employer may be in breach if he fails to show that the contractual payment was not due if the employee does not complete his probationary period of service. If the contract of employment says "If you sell our goods and services, we will pay you a commission" without any strings attached, they will be in breach of the contract if they don't pay.

If he has any documentation, he should take it to the CAB or to an employment rights lawyer. If he doesn't have any, he'll have an uphill struggle.

[Le Chat]

Thank you for your answers. He does have a contract, so it needs going through with a fine toot comb. I will find o ut next week. x