Personal injury news

HSBC liable to employee forced to resign after job stress triggered panic attacks, depression
A "diligent" part time bank employee, forced to resign after the stress of her job triggered panic attacks and depression, today fought off an Appeal Court bid to strip her of her £18,000 compensation pay-out.

Wendy Wheeldon's was one of several "stress at work" test cases considered by the court in London and was considered of such importance that the nation's most senior civil judge, the Master of the Rolls, Lord Phillips, presided.

Mrs Wheeldon successfully sued employers HSBC in November last year at Chesterfield County Court and was awarded two years' wages and £3,500 for her "pain and suffering", a total of £18,861.

The county court judge ruled the bank had breached the duty of care it owed the 54-year-old Senior Customer Service Representative by failing to recognise or deal with impending signs of mental breakdown.

Mrs Wheeldon, who worked at HSBC's Alvaston, Derbyshire, branch quit her job in the Autumn of 2000 after suffering months of panic attacks, culminating in the breakdown which forced her resignation.

In the Appeal Court, HSBC's barrister, Robert Stokell, insisted the bank had done nothing wrong.

He argued that Mrs Wheeldon failed to inform her superiors she was under stress, and had repeatedly said she was "OK at work" instead of flagging up any problems.

Mrs Wheeldon, he argued, had family problems, her mother was ill, she was a "vulnerable" person and was already taking anti-depressants.

However, dismissing the bank's appeal, Lord Justice Scott Baker - sitting with Lord Phillips and Lord Justice Tuckey - said there had been "clear signs of impending harm" and her eventual breakdown should have been foreseen by her employers.

Ruling there was "a clear link" between the bank's breach of duty and Mrs Wheeldon's psychiatric injury, the judge said: "She had increasing difficulty in coping with her symptoms so that, in the Autumn of 2000, she felt she had no choice but to resign."

He concluded: "Mrs Wheeldon had problems coping at work. When her mental condition deteriorated she was off work for a period. Following her return, the bank was made aware of her condition by its own occupational health department and the steps it needed to take in the light of that condition.

"It failed to take those steps and her psychiatric injury resulted. The County Court judge correctly applied the law and there is no basis for interfering with his decision. For these reasons, the bank's appeal is dismissed."

The psychiatric injury Mrs Wheeldon suffered was "reasonably forseeable" and the judge said the threat to her health "was in fact foreseen" by the bank which "failed to act on its own medical advice".

"It failed in its duty of care. But for that breach of duty, her symptoms would not have reached the stage where she was unable to cope any longer."


www.butterworths.co.uk 01/03/2005