A McDonald's restaurant employee who was sacked after an undercover agent wrote a negative report about her has been awarded €1,600 by the Employment Appeals Tribunal.
Ms Vanessa Kelly, of Dunmore Gardens, Knocknaheeny, Cork, was dismissed after she served an agent who later reported that she had not been friendly or courteous, was uninterested and lacked enthusiasm.
The agent, from an international company called Gap-Busters, also had to wait two minutes and 10 seconds for food, whereas the required limit was one minute.
Ms Kelly's employer, Travglen Ltd, trading as McDonald's Restaurant, Mallow Road, Cork, claimed it had no option but to dismiss her "on the spot" in December 2002. It had previously warned Ms Kelly about her timekeeping, but she was dismissed on the basis of the Gap-Busters report.
The company told the tribunal that it used the services of Gap-Busters to grade stores under three headings: quality, service and cleanliness. An unannounced checker called to each store three times a month, gave an on-the-spot grading to the restaurant and its employees, and then furnished a report.
The company said the report that resulted in Ms Kelly's dismissal included a grade of 38 per cent for service, and was the worst the store had received.
Ms Kelly, who was a floor manager, told the tribunal that customers were be in a queue for no more than two minutes and were to be served food within a minute of placing their order.
However, at very busy times it was not possible to maintain such standards. Her failure to make eye contact with the checker from Gap-Busters might have been because she was watching the crew that was working under her supervision.
She was later called to a meeting and told that her work was unsatisfactory, and that she had been named in the Gap-Busters report. Prior to this she had been praised for her work.
The tribunal said it was "grossly unfair" to summarily dismiss Ms Kelly on the basis of one adverse report. It awarded her €1,275 for unfair dismissal, and €330 due under minimum notice legislation.
