A FORMER employee at a south Essex coach firm wins claim over equal pay and sex discrimination after a tribunal hearing found she had been paid less than male colleagues for similar out-of-hours work.
Felicity Stewart brought the claims against Galloway European Coachlines Ltd after working for the Rochford-based company from November 2022 until her resignation in September 2024.
At an employment tribunal, Judge Hutchings found Ms Stewart’s equal pay complaint was “well founded” and concluded the company had directly discriminated against her because of sex.
The tribunal heard Ms Stewart was employed in an office-based assistant operations role, but also carried out driving AND on-call duties outside her contracted 40 hours a week.
She argued this work was the same as, or broadly similar to, work done by three male colleagues, who were paid higher hourly rates.
The tribunal found Ms Stewart was paid £12.98 an hour for extra work, while male colleagues received higher bonus and unsocial-hours rates of up to £19.30 and £18.80 and hour.
In the report published last week, Judge Hutchings said the company’s pay structure “lacks clarity and transparency” and found the claimant had been paid less for broadly similar driving, on-call and supervision work.
The judge said the respondent had focused on “pernickety” differences between the roles, but these “fade into insignificance” when set against the broader evidence that Ms Stewart drove coaches out of hours and appeared on the on-call rota.
Judge Hutchings said the respondent had failed to provide a genuine non-discriminatory explanation for the pay difference.
Hutchings stated: “I cannot accept that the respondent genuinely believed that the extra hours worked by the claimant were covered by her contract, particularly when she was driving coaches at 3am.
“Therefore, I must conclude that the reason for the difference in pay was the claimant’s sex.”
However, Ms Stewart’s claims for indirect sex discrimination, unauthorised deductions from wages, sick pay and notice pay were dismissed.
Her constructive unfair dismissal claim was also dismissed because she did not have two years’ continuous service.
In response, a spokeswoman for Galloway said: “The board are very disappointed the company was deemed to have breached equal pay and opportunities legislation which was never our intent.
“Professional HR advice was taken throughout the process, and at all times the board were advised the company was being fair and operating in accordance with the law.
“The tribunal found otherwise, we have apologised unreservedly to the employee concerned and immediately settled the award.
“We are proud of our balance of male and female employees, which extends to board representation, and have taken careful note from the tribunal how to improve our processes moving forward.”
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