Store manager's WeChat ultimatum costs Silvertime Trading almost $28k in ERA ruling
Silvertime Trading Limited unjustifiably dismissed a client advisor after a manager threatened her termination, ERA member Simon Greening ruled on 21 August 2026.
A recorded meeting that ended with mall security called to remove the client advisor from the store breached the company's good faith obligations, the Employment Relations Authority found.
The advisor, based at a Newmarket store, was called to a meeting with her area manager on 19 July 2025 without being told its purpose. She recorded the conversation. The transcript before the Authority showed the manager presenting her with two options: resign or be dismissed. "If you resign, you give me the key," he told her, before the exchange grew heated.
Pushed back on, the manager gave her seven days' notice to either write a resignation letter or accept termination. The meeting ended with him demanding she hand over her store key and, when she did not comply immediately, phoning mall security to have her removed. The transcript recorded him telling her "you were fired, you get no compensation."
Objectively viewed, the combination of the manager's comments and actions amounted to a dismissal, Greening found. The company had not raised any allegations with the advisor before the meeting, had not investigated its concerns, and had not given her a chance to respond, breaching s 103A(3) of the Employment Relations Act 2000.
A related unjustified disadvantage grievance was also established over the company's failure to follow a fair process, though no separate compensation was awarded for it to avoid double recovery.
Calling the company's conduct at the meeting deliberate, serious and sustained, Greening ordered a $2,500 penalty under s 4A of the Act. He noted there was no substantive justification for terminating the advisor's employment and that she was not allowed to finish her shift.
A second, separate breach was found under s 27(2) of the Holidays Act 2003: the company had deducted 26 hours of annual leave from her final pay rather than paying it out, resulting in orders for $650 in outstanding holiday pay plus a $500 penalty.
Colleagues from other stores watched as she was escorted out, and Greening accepted the dismissal affected her sleep, eating and ability to complete her master's degree at the University of Auckland. For the resulting hurt, humiliation and injury to feelings, he awarded $18,000.
Lost remuneration of $6,240, equivalent to 13 weeks' wages, was also ordered, after Greening found the employment relationship would not have continued beyond three months given the breakdown between the advisor and her manager.
The company's counterclaim, alleging the advisor had not returned a company mobile phone, was dismissed. Her evidence that she reported the phone missing to police on the day she misplaced it was accepted, and no evidence was found that she had continued using the company's WeChat account afterward.
No reduction was applied to any of the remedies for contribution, with Greening finding no evidence the advisor's conduct contributed to her dismissal. Costs were reserved, with the parties encouraged to resolve the matter between themselves.
