Thinking of raising a grievance (formal complaint) at work? Here we share some advice from an HR practitioner's perspective on improving your chances of a positive outcome.
Unfortunately, assisting employees is regulated activity under Financial Conduct Authority rules, which means we’re unable to directly help you if you are an employee. However, this article should help point you in the right direction.
You may be wondering what the chances are of your grievance being upheld. Is it worth raising, or will the organisation just close ranks and reject your complaint?
In particular, you may worry that HR will be on the employer's side and therefore be biased against you.
Any self-respecting HR professional will not look for a reason to dismiss your complaint. If it’s valid, they will advise the company accordingly with any appropriate recommendations for a remedy.
We've worked alongside many in-house HR teams over the years, and we can assure you that reasonable, well-founded complaints are taken seriously.
However, in our experience, many grievances arise from a combination of emotion, miscommunication and misunderstanding. There are almost always two sides to a story, so it's essential to have realistic expectations on what a positive outcome looks like.
Unless the situation involves something very serious, e.g. blatant harassment or discrimination, we strongly recommend trying to resolve the problem informally before raising a formal grievance.
Your management should prefer to avoid conflict with employees, and so it's worth trying to raise your concerns or even ask for mediation to try and find an amicable solution.
We also strongly recommend trying mediation as an alternative to raising a grievance if you're having difficulties with someone at work. Mediation can be very successful at resolving problems without having to either "win" or "lose" a grievance. It's worth asking your HR department if this is an option.
If you've decided to raise a grievance, the first thing you should do is structure your complaint.
Write down what your complaint or concern is. Think about the history and time line of events leading up to this point. Also, think about what evidence you have to support your complaint. This could be emails, text or instant messages, other witnesses, and even verbal conversations.
A clear, well defined complaint is easier to investigate and resolve. In addition, be clear about what remedy you are looking for. What would satisfy your complaint?
In summary, you should be sure that:
The key word here is reasonable. Human psychology means that we all tend to believe our own view of the world is correct. As a result, it’s easy to believe in the righteousness of our complaint. We become emotionally invested in our complaint and struggle to accept that we could be wrong. Or at least that there’s two sides to the story.
Always consider Hanlon’s Razor; could you be misinterpreting incompetence or error as malice?
That doesn’t mean your complaint isn’t valid. It’s simply worth considering whether the issue was caused by someone screwing up, rather than any evil agenda. If so, then it may help your complaint be less adversarial in posture. This can improve the chances of a successful outcome.
You may be considering a complaint about bullying, harassment or discrimination against someone, e.g. a manager. It's really important to understand what these mean and what would qualify.
Bullying is behaviour that is deliberately hostile, intimidating or humiliating, including an abuse of power. Often a pattern of behaviour but could be a one-off incident.
However, bullying should not be confused with conflict.
Getting unwelcome feedback, being held accountable by a manager or having a disagreement with someone does not constitute bullying. Often, individuals resent getting messages they don't like and try to frame it as bullying when it's just disagreement.
Harassment is sometimes confused with bulllying, as it also can involve hostile, intimidating or humiliating behaviour. The difference with harassment is that the behaviour is related to a protected characteristic.
Sexual harassment is unwanted behaviour or comments of a sexual nature. This can include lewd gestures, sexual advances, repeated requests for a date and unwelcome physical contact.
A harassment complaint can also cover less favourable treatment as a result of harassment. For example, if you are bullied or further harassed after reporting or submitting to harassment in the past.
Someone directly discriminates against you if you suffer a detriment or less favourable treatment because you have, or are believed to have, a protected characteristic.
Indirect discrimination is when a practice or policy applies to everyone equally, but this equal treatment does not take into account your protected characteristic, resulting in less favourable treatment.
However, you will need to show the connection between the behaviour you are complaining about and the protected characteristic in question. For example, it's not enough to claim that negative comments are age discrimination just because they come from a younger person. Those comments would need to specifically reference your age in a discriminatory way.
As mentioned above, do try informal resolution first. You should first take your complaint to your line manager. If they are the subject of your complaint, then take it to their manager.
If the nature of your complaint means you can’t do that, or if you feel they didn’t handle it correctly, you can take your complaint to HR. Some small businesses may not have a dedicated HR department. If so, you will have to inform your manager that you want to raise a formal grievance.
Your employer should set up a meeting with you and, in most cases, an independent investigating officer or “hearing manager” to hear your complaint. This should happen without undue delay. Acas recommend that this meeting happens within five working days.
At this meeting, you should clearly explain your grievance to the investigating officer. You can also propose a solution, if you have one in mind. If you have evidence, you can present it, if you haven’t already sent a copy. It's common for HR or the investigating manager to take notes of the discussion.
You have the right to be accompanied to a grievance meeting by either a trade union representative (if you have one) or a presently employed colleague.
If you choose to have a companion to support you, you should let your employer know who the companion will be at least 24 hours before the meeting.
Your companion is allowed to confer with you, take notes for you, and help you present your case. However, the companion cannot answer questions on your behalf. Companions are expected to be professional and not to disrupt the discussion, e.g. they must not obstruct anyone else speaking at the session.
Your employer will probably need to investigate your complaint. If they do, they must do so fairly. It’s common for a manager within the company to act as the investigating officer. Ideally, they should be independent from the complaint and the persons involved in it.
However, this is not always possible, especially in small businesses and the law does not require employers to use an independent investigator. Sometimes, employers may ask HR providers like us to assist them in this situation.
In addition to meeting with you, the investigating officer may meet with other persons named in the complaint narrative. They will also consider any evidence you provided, and then they will write up their findings.
Once your employer has considered your grievance, you should get a written outcome letter.
This letter will explain the decision reached over your grievance and whether it is upheld or not. If there were several issues in your grievance, the outcome should explain which ones were upheld and which were not. The letter should also explain the reasons for the decision.
An outcome that upholds a grievance might also explain what remedial action the employer proposes to take.
You will have the right to appeal against the outcome. However, there must be good grounds for an appeal. Simply not liking the outcome is not enough. Examples of grounds for an appeal include:
You should appeal in writing, explaining the grounds for the appeal. Note that an appeal is not intended to re-hear your original grievance. Instead, it is supposed to examine the grounds for the appeal.
The appeal is the final stage of the process. If you are still unsatisfied after an appeal, then you either have to come to terms with the outcome, or decide whether you have sufficient grounds for going to an Employment Tribunal.
If the situation is so serious that you feel going to a Tribunal is justified, you should start by initiating the Acas early conciliation process. If that is unable to resolve the situation, you will be provided with an Acas 'certificate number' that will enable you to file a claim with the Employment Tribunal.
We strongly recommend getting expert advice before going down this route.
