A financial adviser who was accused of making sexual remarks to female colleagues was unfairly dismissed by Barclays due to procedural failures.
Omar Nayfeh was dismissed from Barclays in July 2024 for gross misconduct. He was accused of making numerous sexual remarks to a younger female colleague, including “If I show you my willy, will that make us friends?”, “What’s the youngest a 40-year-old can go with?” and telling her to buy some “sexy underwear from Victoria’s Secret”.
A different female colleague had alleged Nayfeh had said: “I miss the days when we could hit women.”
These comments were in breach of Barclays’ bullying and harassment policy as contained in “The Barclays Way”, its code of conduct.
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The code of conduct emphasised that the bank took its “values and mindset” behaviours very seriously and that colleagues were expected to act in line with these values. This included a “no tolerance” approach to bias, bullying and harassment.
It gave examples of sexual harassment, including written or verbal comments. Nayfeh admitted to the Glasgow employment tribunal that in annual Barclays Way training, he would often simply complete the quiz at the end rather than review the content.
After the allegations about his conduct were made, the bank launched a formal investigation. Nayfeh admitted making some of the remarks but not all, adding that he was surprised that he had never been reported to HR before in his 10 years at Barclays.
The incident progressed to a disciplinary hearing and Nayfeh was warned the possible outcome of this would be dismissal. The person conducting the hearing did not interview any other witnesses or carry out any further investigations.
The disciplinary hearing took place in March 2024, but the tribunal heard there was “some extraordinary delay” of more than four months, with Nayfeh not hearing the outcome until late July.
He appealed the outcome, including an argument that the investigation had not been conducted correctly, and that “the case for dismissal had been based on probability and not fact”.
The appeal was led by a different investigator, who felt that some of the charges against Nayfeh had been “expanded without warning”, but that the dismissal remained fair because the comments contradicted the standards on the whole.
Again, Nayfeh did not hear the outcome of his appeal in September until December. He was told that the penalty of dismissal was justified.
Employment Judge Whitcombe ruled: “If a fair investigation had been carried out, then more cogent evidence of the claimant’s guilt might have emerged, as well as more cogent evidence of innocence. Both are possibilities.”
Whitcombe criticised the initial investigation for focusing too much on Nayfeh’s demeanor, and found that Barclays’ disciplinary and grievance process was “seriously flawed”.
Furthermore, the disciplinary outcome had been “unnecessarily and unfairly delayed”, he said.
Although Nayfeh’s claim for unfair dismissal was successful, the tribunal reduced his compensation by 15% for contributory fault and 50% to reflect the chance that he would have been dismissed by the same date if the process had been conducted fairly.
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