“The provision that the date of dismissal shall be the date on which the employee left the service of the employer, if earlier than the date of termination of the contract, appears to contemplate a situation in which the employee left the service of the employer before the expiry of any notice which might have been given. It also means that employees who left their work because of intolerable conditions, and then subsequently resigned, are deemed dismissed on the date they left work [Helderberg International Importers v McGahey NO (2015) 36 ILJ 1586 (LC)].” Grogan J Workplace Law Juta 2020
From this quotation from John Grogan’s book, I suggest that the date of dismissal is the date on the on which the employee was physically present at the employer’s premises.
In circumstances where the employee is not routinely working from the employer’s premises, I think that the most likely approach for identifying the date of dismissal would be to identify the last date on which the employee actually provided work.
INGRID LEWIN
