Fired worker’s side hustle revealed in misfired text

A maintenance worker’s personal business was revealed in a mistaken text message, and a paper trail exposed that the company’s money was used to fund his own supplies.

Being found to have contravened his employer’s motor vehicle policy, falsified timesheets, and failed to provide invoices for supplies purchased on the company card, Bradley Waye was terminated by his employer, Entire Building Services (EBS), on 13 August 2025.

The Fair Work Commission found he had used company resources to run his own private operation.

In her 12 March 2026 decision, commissioner Oanh Thi Tran tossed Waye’s unfair dismissal application, determining that EBS had complied with the Small Business Fair Dismissal Code when firing Waye.

Waye commenced employment with EBS around 15 August 2023 and performed commercial building maintenance duties on a day-to-day basis, which included replacing locks, door handles, “patch and paint” jobs, and safety works.

In October 2024, Waye accidentally posted a personal invoice to the work group chat, then promptly took it down.

His employer managed to view the invoice before it was taken down and was led to believe that Waye was using EBS resources to run his own business.

This was confirmed in December 2024, when Waye bought acrylic sheets for personal work, directing the invoice to EBS; and in March 2025, he bought tools on the company’s Bunnings card, which his employer asserted were not for EBS work-related purposes.

Further, Waye used his company car for personal use on multiple occasions, despite the company’s motor vehicle policy stating that employers were not to do so except for “minor trips” such as grocery runs after work or school pick-up and drop-offs.

After the EBS administrative officer cross-checked the GPS records of the motor vehicle and Waye’s timesheets, she formed the view that while Waye started late and finished early, he submitted false timesheets.

On 8 August 2025, after he was informed that an apprentice at the company was lent a Mitsubishi Triton utility vehicle, he texted his employer: “What’s the deal with [an apprentice] getting the triton [sic] ute? I do good work for Entire, but this has left a sour taste mate [sic], my work quality won’t drop off, but ill [sic] be looking for another job. Im [sic] being honest with entire [sic] … Have a great arvo/weekend [sic].”

His employer took this text as a resignation. Following back-and-forth correspondence between the parties over the next five days, on 14 August 2025, Waye’s employer issued him a termination letter, which was effective immediately.

Waye applied for an unfair dismissal remedy on 4 September 2025 after having earlier texted his employer “Ive [sic] enjoyed my time with Entire (EBS), and im [sic] very disappointed it has ended this way”.

Tran found that EBS made procedural failings by not having provided a warning to Waye that clearly indicated that his employment was at risk if there was no improvement, weighing the outcome in favour of a finding that the dismissal was unfair.

However, the commissioner found that since EBS was a small business, which employed 12 people at the time of Waye’s dismissal, and carried out the termination for misconduct in line with the Small Business Fair Dismissal Code, it automatically deemed it not unfair.

Thus, Tran scrapped Waye’s unfair dismissal application, upholding the termination.

The case citation: Mr Bradley Waye v Entire Building Services Pty Ltd (U2025/14437).