Posted Date: 8th August 2024
Ms Lee applied for a Marketing Manager role at R&F Properties, a Chinese real estate company in London. Lee attended two interviews and was offered the job in September 2022. Lee had mentioned the need for flexible working in an interview, which the company said they would be happy to provide after she had passed her probation. Lee resigned from her previous employer and 12 days before she was due to start she was invited to a Microsoft Teams meeting with Ms Zhu, head of overseas development at R&F.
At the start of the meeting Lee mentioned she needed to leave the meeting on time to care for her children. During the meeting they asked about her work experience including the type of clients and projects, however towards the end, Zhu asked Lee how old her children were, to which Lee replied aged four and one. Lee thought the question was out of the blue and had no relevance to the previous topics they had discussed. Lee said she felt confused and anxious over why it had been asked. The company argued it was asked to get to know Lee, to build a rapport and a man would have been asked the same question. However, the tribunal responded that “in our experience it is unlikely that this question would have been asked of a man”.
On 26 October 2022, Lee was informed that her job offer had been withdrawn. R&F properties told the tribunal that Lee would have been made redundant if she had been employed during October 2022, however two new positions had been recruited in September 2022 and further roles in February 2023. The tribunal felt that it was more likely that Zhu gave the instruction to retract Lee’s job offer after hearing about her childcare responsibilities. R&F Properties has been ordered to pay Lee £91,597.82 in compensation which includes injury to feelings payment and financial losses whilst looking for another job, included lost earnings, pension and nursery fees.
On the back of this outcome, employers shouldn’t be deterred from asking questions to get to know prospective employees and build rapport, but be aware of how some personal questions can be received. Asking questions about children’s ages isn’t unlawful, but its the context of how questions are asked which can result in discrimination. Having a set list of interview questions for all candidate can avoid any discrimination claims, which could include a generic “tell me about yourself outside of work” question.