A COMPLAINT made by a former AIB employee under the whistleblowing policy was “nothing more than payback” for a negative review of his work, the Employment Appeals Tribunal heard yesterday.
Former AIB Capital Markets employee Brian Purcell, from Skerries, Co Dublin, has taken an unfair dismissal case against the bank. It was claimed he accessed colleagues’ accounts in March 2008 to check if they had received an annual bonus.
Mr Purcell was told that his performance was below par on February 14th, 2008, Patrick Hanratty SC, for AIB bank, told the tribunal.
Later that day a staff meeting heard that those with performances below par would not receive a bonus.
The next day Mr Purcell made a “speak-up” complaint against his line manager Tim Downey, relating to the accounting system.
Mr Purcell was not formally told that he would not receive a bonus until March 2008.
However, Mr Downey yesterday said that his poor review could not lead to any conclusion other than he was not going to get a bonus.
Mr Downey had submitted the decision not to give the bonus to Mr Purcell in January, before the speak-up complaint was made.
Mr Downey was not told who made complaint against him but said “you would not need to be a member of Mensa to figure out what was going on here”.
Mr Downey said he was told of the complaint just days after he had given a negative performance review to Mr Purcell and it was his personal opinion that “this was nothing more than payback”.
A deterioration in the relationship between the Mr Purcell and Mr Downey after a negative interim performance review in 2007 was also outlined yesterday.
The hearing is expected to resume in December.
