The Claimant in the ET presented a claim, acting in person, which included at least two distinct complaints of direct race discrimination, or harassment, on the part of a named individual, Mr Tripathi. Two companies in the same group were named in the claim form as Respondents, the Claimant having been uncertain as to which was her employer. Subsequently the Claimant applied to amend her claim, attaching a narrative description of a number of alleged incidents, and including new allegations of sex discrimination. She then also applied to be permitted to add Mr Tripathi as a Respondent. Those applications were considered at a hearing, by which time the Claimant had recently appointed solicitors. The applications were refused. The Claimant’s solicitors then applied for the decision not to add Mr Tripathi to be revisited on the basis of a material change in circumstances, and/or for fresh consideration to be given to adding him as a Respondent to the existing complaints, and for another named individual to be joined. In a further written decision those applications were refused. The Claimant appealed.

The EAT allowed the appeal. In the first decision, the ET should have considered, first, to what extent the document tabled by the Claimant contained voluntary particulars of the race-related allegations in the claim form, which did not require permission to amend, and also whether to grant permission to add the remaining matters that were raised as factually wholly new complaints. Having thus determined the scope of the complaints, as particularised and/or amended, it should then have considered whether to add Mr Tripathi as a Respondent to those complaints. As to the second decision, on the question of whether to add Mr Tripathi as a Respondent, the ET had not corrected the error in the first decision, because it did not properly identify and engage with the application on the basis that it was now being asked solely to consider adding Mr Tripathi as a Respondent to the original complaints.