Court rules disability worker resigned despite "we are done here" meeting

A disability services worker who claimed she was fired during a heated meeting actually resigned, a federal court has ruled.

The Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia found that a support coordinator was not dismissed by her employer, Australian Carers Pty Ltd, after a tense office meeting in January 2022 - despite her belief that the words "we are done here" ended her employment.

The employee had worked for the disability services provider from August 2, 2021, to January 18, 2022, earning $60,000 per year as a support coordinator. The trouble started in late December 2021, when she contracted COVID-19 and asked to work from home during her mandatory isolation period. Her employer denied the request, citing a blanket policy against remote work.

When she returned to the office on January 14, 2022, she discovered that a senior colleague - the state manager - had been granted permission to work from home. She vented her frustration to colleagues about what she saw as inconsistent treatment.

Four days later, the company's general manager called her into an unscheduled meeting. According to the employee's evidence, the general manager asked her about being "unhappy," and the conversation quickly escalated. The employee told the court the general manager spoke in a "very loud, angry and aggressive voice," used large hand movements, and pointed his finger at her. She said he told her that if she was "not happy, then don't be here," called her "unprofessional," said he had "made a mistake" in hiring her, and ended the meeting by standing up, saying "we are done here," and walking out of his own office.

The employee packed up her personal belongings, handed her work phone and car park remote to a colleague, and left.

In his September 7, 2026, judgment, Judge Lucev found the phrase "we are done here" brought the meeting to a close - not the employment relationship. The court pointed to several factors: the general manager never used the word "sacked" or "dismissed"; there was no allegation of serious misconduct that would ordinarily warrant summary dismissal; and the employer maintained the employee had not been dismissed at all.

The court also observed that the employee appeared uncertain about her own status. That evening, she emailed the general manager asking him to "confirm that as per our conversation today my services are no longer required." He replied within 12 minutes, writing that her employment "was not ended by myself or any person within this company" and that her actions - handing in company property and leaving - had been "reasonably interpreted as a resignation without notice and immediate effect."

The court concluded that the employee resigned without giving the notice required under the applicable award and her employment contract.

All of the employee's general protections claims also failed. The court found her complaints about the work-from-home policy were not made to a person empowered to deal with them, so they did not qualify as exercising a workplace right under section 341 of the Fair Work Act 2009 (Cth). The court also held that refusing to allow remote work did not amount to discrimination, because the employee and the state manager held different roles at different levels and were not appropriate comparators.

On the question of harassment, the court found the general manager's conduct at the January 18 meeting - while "possibly acrimonious" - did not reach the legal threshold. Harassment, the court said, requires "persistent disturbance" or "torment," not a single angry exchange. A one-off confrontational meeting, even a heated one, was not enough.

Australian Carers was not entirely in the clear, though. The court found the employer breached the Fair Work Act in three ways.

First, it failed to provide the employee with a Fair Work Information Statement at the start of her employment, or at any time afterward. The court rejected the employer's argument that the employee could have accessed the statement on a workplace computer, holding that the law requires the employer to actually "give" the document to the employee.

Second, the employer never displayed a roster for the employee's ordinary hours of work, as required by the Social, Community, Home Care and Disability Services Industry Award 2010. Australian Carers argued rostering was unnecessary for a standard Monday-to-Friday worker, but the court found the award requirement applied to "each employee" without carve-outs.

Third, the employer's payslips failed to record the employee's entitlements to travel allowance, overtime, on-call overtime, and annual leave loading, in breach of section 536 of the Fair Work Act.

The court found the employee was technically owed $1,739.49 under the award - $1,107.93 for travel allowance, $227.70 for overtime, and $403.86 for annual leave loading. But the award's absorption clause - a standard provision that allows overaward salary to offset award obligations - wiped out the debt. The employee's weekly pay of $1,153.85 exceeded the award minimum of $840.10, generating $7,655.50 in total overaward payments across her employment. These overaward payments more than covered the underpayments, and no money was owed.

Critically, the court held the absorption clause did not excuse the record-keeping failures. Even where overaward pay covers award entitlements, employers must still itemise those entitlements on payslips. The court noted that proper records help both employees and employers track obligations - including the point at which an absorption clause might cease to have effect.

The employee had also sought to hold the general manager personally liable under section 550 of the Fair Work Act. The court dismissed this, finding the pleading was insufficiently detailed and the evidence did not establish the general manager was knowingly involved in what amounted to administrative and record-keeping failures.

A penalty hearing for the proven contraventions has been listed for December 23, 2026.