Despite being aware of Mr C's disability, this firm failed to make reasonable adjustments and should have taken more care with the terminology they used...
Mr C had been diagnosed with specific learning difficulties. He felt that he had been treated unfairly at work because of this and wanted to pursue a disability discrimination claim against his employer.
Mr C contacted his legal expenses insurer to fund his claim. The legal expenses insurer then instructed the firm to assess the merits of the case. It is within the legal expenses insurer’s policy that the claim needed to be more likely to succeed than fail for them to fund it. This meant the claim had to have prospects of success of 51% or more.
The firm contacted Mr C to find out more information about his claim. They later concluded that the prospects of success for his case were below 51%, which meant that Mr C’s case could not be funded by his legal expenses insurer.
Mr C was unhappy with the firm’s communication during this time and complained that:
The firm accepted that their service was unreasonable for complaint number 2 and apologised shortly afterwards, but Mr C did not feel it was genuine.
We concluded that the firm’s service was unreasonable for both complaints.
Mr C did not specifically ask the firm for any adjustments, but the firm were aware of his disability and how this affected his understanding of written correspondence.
Mr C later told the firm that it was easier for him to communicate verbally rather than in writing. Whilst the firm did attempt to call Mr C, they also sent him a detailed email that he struggled to understand.
The evidence showed that the firm referred to Mr C’s disability incorrectly when they responded to his complaint. We recognised that it was a genuine error but concluded that the firm should have been more careful with the terminology they used.
Mr C felt that his disability had not been considered during the matter. He felt upset because of this which could be seen from his communication with the firm. Mr C experienced minor incidents of unreasonable service, but they did not affect Mr C over a long period of time. We proposed that a payment within our modest award of £200 should be made to Mr C as compensation for the emotional impact.
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