I'm angry with Waitrose

Labradora 18.03; "Yes I agree with that. They could have given him a formal warning surely. Waitrose could have issued a reminder on their confidential company intranet reminding employees not to tackle shoplifters for their own safety and on pain of disciplinary action"

Smith told the newspaper himself that Waitrose had previously warned him and he 'kicked himself' for reacting as he did'.

Waitrose would have been very careful about any unfair dismissal claims, it sounds like there were previous warnings or incidents

David49: 05.29.

I agree. I posted upthread it is open to Smith to lodge an appeal in an industrial tribunal if he feels he has been unfairly dismissed. He has nothing to lose in so doing. There is no limit to the financial damages awarded if an employee is successful.

It is highly improbable that Waitrose HR would support dismissal unless there were legal evidential grounds. However it is not legally able to publicly disclose information about Smith to defend its actions- it can merely state "all due process has been followed" which it has.

I think I may have read that the former employee is autistic. Possibly a facet of his personality, the dogged pursuit of the shoplifter against managerial advice maybe?

TerriBull 11.32.

If that is the case another reason for Waitrose to protect Smith. Waitrose of course has a legal duty of care for employees as enshrined in the Health and Safety at Work Act- hence why it has a policy in place for employees not to approach or apprehend shoplifters (unless a security guard that will be subject to their own specific job description and policy).

Anyone with autism is arguably more vulnerable and thus must necessarily follow the policy- as Smith admitted he was warned to do.

That is TerriBull I agree with you and that is likely.....

Yes, Waitrose should have a duty of care towards its employees and Mr Smith had (apparently) had a previous warning.

However, that duty of care, especially towards a partner who may be on the autistic spectrum as Terribull posted, should mean that they should have found him alternative employment in a non-customer facing role as I suggested earlier.

I still think they were heavy-handed in dealing with this, and it seems to be against their well-publicised description of how their staff are not just employees but partners, owners, with a voice in business decisions, etc etc.
www.jlpjobs.com/about-the-partnership/being-a-partner/

The "Partnership" has cut 3,800 jobs in a year and plans 11,000 more job cuts over the next five years. Well, 10,999 now Mr Smith has gone.
It really isn't worth the paper it's written on, or the space it takes up on the internet.

I must say the staff at our nearest Waitrose are lovely but they have made more tills self-service.

X posts.
It took me ages to type so I hadn't seen yours LemonJam.

Our nearest waitrose still opens more tills if there is a queue.

They've taken some of the tills away and put in self-service tills.

Yes they have near me - but lots of people are choosing the self service so the queue is no longer.