WRC awards car salesman €10,000 for unfair dismissal

This report is a localnews.ie summary based on public court reporting and records; sources are listed below.

The Workplace Relations Commission upheld Alex Collins’s unfair dismissal complaint against Kevin O’Leary Silversprings Ltd, which trades as the Kevin O’Leary Group, and awarded him €10,000. Collins had been dismissed in November 2024 after allegations involving a customer’s trade-in and a Renault Kadjar. He denied any fraudulent intent and said staff understood buying trade-in cars to be a perk of the job.

Adjudicator Úna Glazier-Farmer found the dealership may have had reasonable grounds to believe Collins had engaged in misconduct. But she ruled the dismissal unfair because the process lacked impartiality: director Kevin O’Leary investigated the matter and decided the sanction. She also cited short notice of the disciplinary meeting and inadequate documentation of the dismissal decision.

The award reflected Collins’s failure to adequately mitigate his losses by looking for new work and his contribution to the dismissal, the adjudicator said.