Early conciliation and employment tribunal data for England, Scotland, and Wales: April to June 2024

• Open track group cases made up 40% of group cases in April to June 2024, falling from 49% in January to March 2024, but higher in comparison to 24% in October to December 2023, and 32% in July to September 2023.
• Open track cases accounted for the largest number of individual cases between April and June with regards to employee-led early conciliation notification numbers, making up 36% of cases.
• Standard track cases accounted for 68% of employer-led cases for April to June; this has decreased from 74% in January to March.
• 68% of early conciliation notifications did not progress to employment tribunal between January to March 2024, remaining steady from the previous quarter.
• Open track cases made up around 50% of employment tribunal claim form (ET1) receipts within each of the 5 quarters between April 2023 and June 2024.
• 78% of employment tribunal cases received did not go on to have a hearing in April to June 2024, up slightly from 76% that was maintained across each of the 4 quarters between April 2023 to March 2024.

When an employee wants to make a claim against their employer at an employment tribunal, in most cases they must notify Acas first. Acas offers early conciliation to try to reach an agreement between the employee and employer and avoid the employee making a claim to an employment tribunal.

In some circumstances, the employer may approach Acas to help resolve a potential dispute. This can also be handled using early conciliation.

Early conciliation notifications can be made:

• by an individual against their employer
• on behalf of a group against their employer
• by an employer where a dispute concerning staff requires resolution

Employee-led early conciliation notifications

Around 95% of all early conciliation notifications came from employees across each of the 5 quarters between April 2023 and June 2024.

Open track cases had the largest number of group cases with an assigned track in April to June 2024, accounting for 40%. This has decreased from 49% in January to March 2024. In comparison, group cases with no track assigned held the highest proportion of cases in October to December 2023, accounting for 33% of group cases.

Open track cases had the largest number of individual cases, accounting for 36% of all employee-led cases in April to June 2024. This is down slightly from 37% in January to March 2024 and October to December 2023, but an increase compared to 33% in both July to September 2023 and April to June 2023.

Employer-led early conciliation notifications

Employer-led early conciliation notifications made up around 5% of early conciliation notifications in the most recent 2 quarters from January to June 2024.

Standard track cases had the largest number of employer-led notifications in all 5 quarters from April 2023 to June 2024. This has decreased from the previous quarter, accounting for 68%, compared to 74% of cases in January to March 2024. Standard track cases accounted for 67% in October to December 2023, 61% in July to September 2023, and 57% in April to June 2023.

Some early conciliation notifications are not suitable for conciliation and the service is not mandatory so some claimants will refuse the offer.

Early conciliation cases not progressed to conciliation

In the 5 quarters from April 2023 to June 2024, just over 20% of early conciliation cases were closed without parties engaging in early conciliation. Most of these were cases with no track assigned which made up 85% of cases in April to June, up from 63% in January to March, and 59% in October to December. These are where Acas has not been able to get in touch with the claimant to gather enough information to assign a track, so this is to be expected.

Conversely, cases from all the assigned tracks that did not progress to conciliation decreased in April to June 2024 compared to the previous quarters.

It should be noted that around October 2023, changes were made to the notification form. These changes allowed users to select from more options as to the reason for their dispute. Their selection then determines the track for the case.

Fast track cases were the lowest proportion of the cases that did not progress to conciliation. Of cases with an assigned track, open track cases made up the highest proportion of cases that were not conciliated across each of the 5 quarters between April 2023 and June 2024.

Settlement of early conciliation cases

Due to the potential time lag between an early conciliation certificate being issued and the corresponding ET1 reaching Acas, these data cannot be accurately reported until after a period of time has elapsed and so are one quarter behind all the other statistics in this bulletin. This table covers early conciliation, employee-led and group cases only, and is based on outcomes of cases received in April 2023 to March 2024.

Around 68% of cases did not lead to the submission of an ET1 throughout October 2023 to March 2024, falling from 69% in July to September, but up from 66% in April to June 2023. Of those with an assigned track, the fast track cases were most likely not to progress to ET1. The proportion of cases that did not progress to tribunal increased for all cases with an assigned track in April to June 2024 compared to the previous quarter.

If a case is not resolved by early conciliation, the claimant can submit an ET1 form to make a claim to an employment tribunal. Conciliation can also be carried out at this stage to try to resolve the case without progressing to tribunal.

The highest level of ET1 receipts was received in open track cases, accounting for around 50% of all ET1 receipts in each of the 5 quarters between April 2023 and June 2024. The lowest proportion of ET1 receipts was received in cases with no track assigned, accounting for less than 1% of all ET1 receipts in each of the 5 quarters between April 2023 and June 2024.

These data are based on cases that had an outcome within the quarters covered in this bulletin and do not correspond to the cases that were received in Table 5.

78% of all employment tribunal cases in April to June 2024 did not progress to a tribunal hearing, up from 76% across each of the quarters between April 2023 and March 2024. Of cases with an assigned track, open track cases were most likely to not progress to a hearing, with fast track cases most likely to progress to a hearing. Acas settled around 71% of the cases that did not progress to tribunal in April to June 2024, up slightly from 70% in January to March 2024, but down from 73% in October to December 2023. This figure was 69% in July to September 2023, and 73% in April to June 2023. The remaining cases were withdrawn.

Conciliation or conciliating

The process of negotiation when an Acas conciliator mediates between parties in an employment dispute to try and reach agreement without going to an employment tribunal.

Conciliator

A government official employed by Acas who mediates or conciliates between parties in an employment dispute.

Early conciliation

Acas service introduced in April 2014. Voluntary process of conciliating before a formal employment tribunal claim has been submitted with the aim of resolving the case. The prospective claimant submits an early conciliation notification to Acas, usually online, and Acas will then offer them early conciliation.

Early conciliation notification

Submission to Acas (usually online) required to begin conciliation.

Employment tribunal (ET)

Court of law charged with hearing cases within employment jurisdictions, although cases with monetary value may be heard elsewhere.

ET1

Form used by claimants to make a claim to an employment tribunal. The form is copied to Acas to allow ET1 conciliation to proceed until either the dispute is resolved, or a legal judgement is reached. It’s free to submit an ET1.

ET1 avoided

Disputes that, at the time of publication, had led to an early conciliation notification but an ET1 had not been submitted.

Post ET1 conciliation

Acas has a duty to attempt conciliation between the claimant and their employer once an ET1 has been submitted and passed to Acas. If a settlement can be reached or if the claimant agrees to withdraw their claim, the dispute is considered to be resolved. Otherwise, it will proceed to an employment tribunal hearing.

Group case

Cases which have been grouped together for conciliation because they are against the same employer and relate to the same dispute. 'Claimants in groups' are the number of claimants represented by these group claims.

Jurisdiction

Legal classification of the type of dispute a claim is made about. One case may contain more than one jurisdiction. For example, an unfair dismissal claim may also contain a claim under the Wages Act for unpaid wages. This could be changed in an employment tribunal.

Live case

Early conciliation notifications or ET1s still going through the conciliation process.

Track

How Acas loosely classes the complexity of each case, based on the jurisdictions in the ET1 form, or the suggested jurisdictions assigned to early conciliation notifications.

The 4 tracks are:

• fast track – straightforward cases mostly relating to money, such as unpaid wages
• standard track – cases that are more complicated than fast track and involve unfair dismissal or a related jurisdiction
• open track – the most legally complex cases with at least one type of discrimination or disclosure jurisdiction
• no track assigned – cases where insufficient information is available to assign indicative jurisdictions (for example, where parties cannot be contacted)

You can find more information in the methodology article and background quality reports on: 

• strengths in the data
• limitations of the data
• appropriate uses of the data
• how the data were created

• Acas early conciliation evaluation 2019
• Employment tribunal statistics on GOV.UK