Bookkeeper manager’s unfair dismissal claim rejected by FWC

An unfair dismissal claim brought by a team leader of bookkeepers has been objected to and ruled as neither harsh, unjust, unreasonable, nor unfair by the Fair Work Commission.

An account manager and team leader of a team of bookkeepers has claimed her dismissal from her place of employment was “unfair” on the basis that she was removed from internal systems and client files during resignation negotiations.

The Fair Work Commission ruled that while the applicant’s dismissal was neither fully initiated by her nor the respondent, her termination was not unfair, unjust, or unreasonable.

The sequence of events

Prior to the termination, the applicant, Cheryl Della Marta, claimed she had been overwhelmed within her management role following the acquisition of another company by the respondent.

On this claim, the respondent raised concerns around Marta’s declining performance and, in March this year, provided her with written requirements of key performance indicators she was expected to meet within her management position.

On 14 May 2025, Marta was issued a first formal warning letter detailing that a review of her performance was to be undertaken and completed by 20 June 2025, which she was said to be “distressed” by.

On the same day, Marta called in sick and initiated a meeting with one of the respondent partners, Mr Takakura, to discuss her options and potential alternative employment.

Marta’s prospective employment she had applied for was with Deconstruct Solutions, which happened to have emailed her a proposed contract on the same day.

Though the proposed contract at Deconstruct was discussed with Takakura within the meeting on 14 May, Marta sent him an email the following day at 12:54pm with an accusation of “unfair treatment and unreasonable workplace expectations”.

Marta’s email also included the request that: “My employment is considered terminated effective today, with four weeks’ notice paid in lieu. The final payment will be made within seven days. The restraints clause in my contract is formally waived and removed.”

One hour later, at 1:54pm, Marta emailed Deconstruct to express her excitement about the proposed employment opportunity and shared that she was in discussion with the respondent about her immediate termination, which she had requested via email.

At 2:54pm, the respondent accepted Marta’s request as outlined in her email at 12:54pm and removed Marta’s access to its internal information technology systems before other employees were notified of her immediate resignation.

This was followed by a responsive email from Takakura to Marta at 3:08pm, which said: “In saying that, I am prepared to accept your resignation effective immediately and also agree to paying out your 4 weeks’ notice as time in lieu which will be paid within 7 days. Any accrued leave entitlements will also be paid out at the same time.”

“As for your second request, in relation to removing your employment restraints being waived, I have spoken to our Head Office in Perth and they have advised that we are unable to remove any restraints from our employment agreements. These restraints are in place to protect our business and therefore I have been directed to decline this request.”

“As your resignation is effective immediately, we will remove your access from our systems and client files straight away. We will also require you to return any property of Carbon’s such as keys, laptops, client files, etc, by close of business today as part of the usual resignation process.”

Takakura finalised this email with a request for Marta to confirm she was in agreement with what had been communicated and that he was open to further discussion if needed.

At 4:43pm, Deconstruct withdrew its employment offer to Marta before she emailed Takakura again at 5:27pm.

In this email, Marta said she had never given the respondent her resignation, as it was still in negotiation and that she would seek legal action based on her having already been removed from the respondent’s internal systems.

The decision

Based on the series of events, the FWC said it was not satisfied that the dismissal was harsh, unjust, or unreasonable.

“In that event, I conclude that the applicant was not unfairly dismissed and that no remedy is available to the applicant,” the FWC said.

This decision was made on multiple factors, the most predominant being that section 386(1)(a) of the act provided that a person was dismissed if the person’s employment with his or her employer had been terminated on the employer’s initiative.

The respondent pointed towards evidence within the email chain and claimed it believed Marta had initiated her termination of employment, had actively sought alternative employment and not attempted to negotiate the terms of her departure.

However, the FWC said that while Marta had put forward the proposed terms of her exit in writing on 15 May, these terms were not agreed to in entirety by the respondent, with the respondent treating the applicant’s correspondence as a resignation to which it had accepted.

It was also noted that the respondent had removed Marta from internal systems before a response was sent to her about her effective termination.

Despite this, the dismissal was still deemed to not be unreasonable or harsh in any sense; therefore, no remedy was necessary.