Apertum Online Ltd

Case Summary

The Claimant applied for interim relief in an automatically unfair dismissal claim under section 103A ERA 1996, alleging he was dismissed for making protected disclosures about data protection breaches in the Respondent's AI customer service platform. Employment Judge Palmer rejected the application, finding that while the Claimant may ultimately succeed on balance of probabilities at the final hearing, he does not meet the higher "pretty good chance of success" threshold required for interim relief, as the Respondent's proffered reasons for dismissal have cogent supporting evidence.

The tribunal found that although the Claimant may ultimately succeed in establishing his automatically unfair dismissal claim on balance of probabilities at the final hearing, he does not meet the higher threshold of "pretty good chance of success" required for interim relief applications. The Respondent's proffered reasons for dismissal had cogent supporting evidence, and the Claimant's materials did not conclusively establish that the principal reason for dismissal was the protected disclosures rather than the reasons advanced by the Respondent.

Use these claim-type pages to compare this decision with other published tribunal cases, outcome patterns, and visible award data.

• •Whether the Claimant made a protected disclosure under sections 43A to H ERA 1996
• •Whether the disclosure was a qualifying disclosure relating to a relevant category and made in the public interest
• •Whether the disclosure related to information which the Claimant reasonably believed tended to show the relevant category was made out
• •Whether the disclosure was made to the employer or other responsible person
• •Whether the principal reason for dismissal was the protected disclosure under section 103A ERA 1996
• •Likelihood of success for automatically unfair dismissal claim under section 128 ERA 1996

1 EMPLOYMENT TRIBUNALS Claimant: Mr Nicholas Riley Respondent: Apertum Online Ltd Heard at: East London Hearing Centre On: 23 April 2026 Before: Employment Judge Suzanne Palmer Representation Claimant: Ms A Brown, Counsel Respondent: Mr G Baker, Counsel JUDGMENT ON APPLICATION FOR INTERIM RELIEF 1. The Claimant’s application for interim relief is not upheld. 2. No order is made for reinstatement, re-engagement or continuation of the contract of employment. REASONS Introduction 1. This hearing was listed to determine the Claimant’s application for interim relief and, if appropriate, to order the claimant’s reinstatement or re-engagement or to grant a continuation of contract order pending the hearing of the complaint of unfair dismissal. 2 2. The Claimant commenced employment with the Respondent on 5 January 2026. He was dismissed on 11 March 2026. His substantive claim relates to a complaint that his dismissal was automatically unfair under Section 103A Employment Rights Act 1996, in that the reason or principal reason was that he had made protected disclosures. 3. The Respondent is a global consumer internet and media company. It had in place a digital platform under its “Sporty” brand name which was used to deal with customer service requests by submitting electronic forms completed by the customer to a large language model system which would respond to the requests using Artificial Intelligence. 4. The Respondent planned to commercialise that digital customer service system and sell it to other businesses to use to engage with their own customers. 5. The Claimant was engaged in a senior role – Head of Customer Service Platform – Business to Business. His responsibility was to lead the transformation of the customer service platform, under the brand name “Please…