Accenture has taken a decade-long employment dispute over the sacking of a manager with endometriosis to the Court of Appeal, asking Britain's second-highest court to restore a 2022 ruling that left her with zero compensation for unfair dismissal.

The case, heard before Lord Justice Bean, Lord Justice Baker and Lady Justice Whipple on Tuesday and Wednesday, turns on how far professional services firms can rely on 'up or out' progression models (a system requiring employees to keep moving toward promotion, treating any stall as underperformance) when dismissing staff with chronic illnesses.

Who is the claimant, and why was she dismissed?

Sanju Pal worked as a management consultant at Accenture for 10 years. The firm dismissed her in July 2019 under what it called its 'up or elsewhere' progression-based performance model — the variant of 'up or out' standard across consulting.

She received consecutive 'not progressing' ratings in August 2018 and March 2019. During that same period she was diagnosed with endometriosis, a chronic condition affecting the womb. The diagnosis produced sickness absences and a phased return to work — a timeline Pal's lawyers argue the firm did not properly weigh.

She subsequently brought claims for unfair dismissal and disability discrimination.

What did the original tribunal decide?

In 2022, the Employment Tribunal (ET, the first-instance UK body for workplace disputes) delivered a split verdict. It found the dismissal procedurally unfair: Accenture breached its own disciplinary and appeals policy by using a misconduct route and failing to involve independent decision-makers.

Yet Pal walked away with nothing for lost earnings. The ET applied a 100 per cent reduction known as a Polkey deduction (a mechanism that strips compensation when the employee would have been fairly dismissed anyway), concluding the outcome would have been the same regardless of procedural flaws.

The ET also dismissed the discrimination claim, holding that endometriosis did not meet the legal definition of disability under the Equality Act 2010. Notably, it offered little detailed reasoning on that point — an omission that later proved decisive.

Why did the appeal tribunal overturn it?

In January 2026, Judge James Tayler of the Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT, which reviews ET decisions on points of law) identified two errors. First, the ET could not simply assume an 'up or out' policy automatically justifies dismissing someone fully capable of performing her contracted role. On that basis, the 100 per cent compensation reduction was unfounded.

Second, the EAT called the ET's treatment of the disability question 'wholly inadequate'. The tribunal had failed to properly analyse the medical evidence, the impact of the condition on day-to-day activities, and the likelihood of recurrence — three statutory pillars of any disability assessment.

Tayler allowed the appeal and remitted the case to a fresh Employment Tribunal hearing before a different panel. That remitted hearing now hangs on the Court of Appeal's verdict.

Commenting after the EAT judgment, Emma Clark, partner, and Imogen Dale, associate, at Keystone Law said the ruling 'sends a clear message to employers about handling long-term health conditions with care. Employers must look beyond absence statistics and engage meaningfully with reasonable adjustments.'

What does Accenture argue?

Accenture is contesting the EAT's reasoning in full. If the Court of Appeal sides with the firm, the original 2022 outcome — unfair dismissal on paper, no compensation in practice, no disability finding — stands.

The New York-listed firm has framed the dispute narrowly. In a statement, it said: 'The original Employment Tribunal determined that Sanju Pal's dismissal was on grounds of performance and was not due to her medical condition, or discriminatory reasons.'

It added: 'Subsequent legal proceedings have not changed the Tribunal's decision, though a new hearing will reconsider some of the issues. As legal proceedings are ongoing, we cannot comment further about the details of the case.'

That framing is accurate but incomplete. The EAT did not overturn the fairness finding itself — it struck down the reasoning that erased Pal's compensation and rejected the tribunal's dismissal of her disability claim. What Accenture did not address is whether an 'up or elsewhere' policy can lawfully anchor a zero-award outcome at all, the precise question Tayler said the ET got wrong.

What does this change for employers?

For professional services firms, the stakes are systemic. Up-or-out models operate at Accenture, McKinsey-style consultancies and law firms across the UK. If the Court of Appeal upholds Tayler's reasoning, employers will find it materially harder to argue that a dismissal was inevitable — and therefore compensation-free — merely because an employee stalled on the promotion track while managing a chronic condition.

Disability analysis carries equal weight. Endometriosis affects a substantial share of women of working age, and the EAT's insistence on rigorous medical assessment, day-to-day impact and recurrence likelihood sets a compliance bar that absence statistics alone cannot clear.

The caveat cuts both ways. Until the Court of Appeal rules — and any further appeal to the Supreme Court is exhausted — the remitted tribunal has yet to rehear the facts, and Pal has won procedural ground, not compensation. Accenture's position remains that performance, not health, drove the dismissal, and the original tribunal agreed with it. The judgment, when it arrives, will settle which of those two readings governs one of British consulting's most consequential HR doctrines.