Judgment No. 3267
Decision
The complaint is dismissed.
Summary
The complainant impugned the decision not to waive the time limit for lodging an internal appeal, claiming that his heavy workload constituted an exceptional circumstance justifying the grant of a waiver.
Judgment keywords
Keywords
time limit; post classification; discretion; complaint dismissed
Considerations 3 and 4
Extract:
"It was not in issue that under Staff Rule 11.1.1(b)(3) the discretionary power to waive the time limits can be exercised in exceptional circumstances. That is what the rule said. In its reasons, the Board pointed to the need for certainty that is created by time limits but noted the discretion to waive them in exceptional circumstances. It did not consider there were such circumstances and that the complainant’s workload would not have prevented him from bringing his appeal in time, though it accepted that may have contributed to him overlooking the time limits.
This reasoning is quite unexceptionable. The complainant argued the reasoning contained a “contradiction”. He pointed to the Board’s acknowledgement in its reasons that the complainant’s heavy workload may possibly have been a contributing factor in the complainant overlooking the deadline. However the substance of what the Board was saying was that it was not satisfied the circumstances were exceptional. It needed to be positively satisfied that they were before it could exercise the discretionary power to waive the time limits. There has been no miscarriage of the exercise of the discretionary power. The Board was not obliged, as the complainant submitted, to involve the Administration and it had power, under Staff Rule 11.1.1(e)(3)(b), to summarily dismiss the appeal as clearly irreceivable. It did so. The complaint to the Tribunal should be dismissed."
Reference(s)
Organization rules reference: Staff Rule 11.1.1(b)(3)
Keywords
internal appeal; time limit; exception; discretion; waiver of internal appeal procedure
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