It can help to prepare information about your case for early conciliation.
Write a summary of your dispute
Write your dispute as a list of events, keeping it brief.
It's useful to include:
- dates of important incidents
- how much money you're owed, if it's about pay
- how long you've worked for your employer
- any reasons your employer gave for their action or decision
- what you've done already to try and resolve the dispute
Here are some examples.
Example 1: not being paid
- Owed my normal wages
- Should have been paid on 31 January
- Owed £300
- Employer has not given a reason for not paying
- Tried to resolve it by speaking to line manager
- Line manager told me to speak to payroll – keep being told to speak to different people but no-one can help me
Example 2: being dismissed
- Worked for employer for 3 years
- Got dismissed on 4 June
- Employer's reason for dismissal was redundancy
- Feel it was unfair as wasn't given proper consultation and employer has now advertised my job online
- Appealed my redundancy but it was rejected
Example 3: being discriminated against
- Feel I've been discriminated against because of my disability
- Have diabetes
- Employer would not make reasonable adjustment to let me start work later to allow for low blood sugar in the morning
- Most recent incident was on 23 May – manager shouted at me for being late in front of colleagues
- Have raised grievance, waiting for final decision
Get supporting documents
It will help your case to gather supporting documents that relate to your dispute, for example:
- payslips (if the dispute is about pay)
- timesheets
- name and contact details of who we need to speak to at your work
- the grievance or appeal letter you sent to your employer
- the email or letter showing the decision or result from your employer
- any other emails or letters relating to the dispute
- a log or diary of events (if you've kept one)
Your conciliator will ask for these when they need them.