An overworked property manager has won almost £400,000 after he racked up a staggering 827 unpaid holiday days over 25 years.
Mohamed Ageli’s requests for holiday were repeatedly refused ‘due to pressure of work’, a tribunal heard, so he agreed to be paid them instead.
The tribunal was provided with memos detailing requests between 1988 and 2002 which showed that in some years Mr Ageli took no holiday at all, while in others he took only a fraction of his entitlement.
A judge heard that after 25 years of work, he was owed an eye-watering £392,000 to cover a total of 827 days of unpaid holiday.
In what an employment tribunal judge described as an ‘unusual case’, Mr Ageli – – whose full name is Mohamed Moassadek Ageli and goes by the name Moss – also won £105,000 in compensation.
Watford Employment Tribunal heard Mr Ageli, 74, joined the Libyan-owned real estate management firm Sabtina Limited in 1987, initially as deputy managing director but then as commercial manager.
He worked in the company’s offices in London and Milton Keynes.
Mr Ageli – whose full name is Mohammed Mossadek Ageli – originally started with 30 days of holiday a year.
Between 1987 and 1989 Mr Ageli took no holiday days because only himself and his PA were full-time employees and they needed to be working constantly for the company to function.
Between 1988 and 1996 he had 200 holiday days refused by the directors.
His holiday entitlement was raised from 30 to 45 days a year in 1996.
In 1998 Mr Ageli, who is a karate ‘sensei’, or instructor, realised that he would not be able to take holiday with the company and so they came to an arrangement to get paid for them instead.
He told the tribunal: “When it almost became the norm that holidays were difficult to have, I wrote to the non-resident managing director of (Sabtina), who was also the managing director of the parent company in Libya.
“I requested that, as and when required, I receive payment in lieu of unutilised holidays because of the circumstances of the company. The managing director agreed and signed the document.
“After years of doing this, it was agreed that there was no need to send any future paperwork for approval or denial and I simply kept a record of my holiday entitlement.”
He described how he had got permission for the agreement with the company’s owners and did not go behind their back to secure the payments even though it was in his power to do so.
He said: “(Sabtina) does not have a pension scheme for the employees, and both myself and my PA were saving the holidays we could not have for when needed or at retirement.”
In both 2001 and 2004 he was paid £15,000 in lieu of holiday, showing that the agreement was indeed in place, but it was agreed that he would not need to take the money each year as it would roll over.
This agreement was in place for decades, with Mr Ageli giving up holiday in return for extra pay, but in May 2022 the board of directors was replaced.
These new directors demanded documentation from the manager and began slowly removing duties from him until he had no role at the company despite being an employee there.
In March 2024 he received an email telling him he was being fired for gross misconduct, with the director claiming he had talked to Mr Ageli about his conduct before but it had not been improved.
Mr Ageli, who earned £123,000 per year, immediately replied saying that this simply was not true and that he had not even been allowed to appeal against the decision, which he said was made with ‘no justification’.
He was also informed that he would not be paid for the 827 unpaid holiday days he had accrued since 1998 – which totalled £392,000.
The decision to dismiss him was upheld and Mr Ageli took Sabtina to an employment tribunal, where Employment Judge George Alliott agreed he had been mistreated by having his holiday pay withheld.
The tribunal ordered the company to pay the full amount of holiday pay owed as well as a total compensation from unfair dismissal for £91,490 and a basic award of £14,070.
The judge found that it was agreed between Mr Ageli and Sabtina that, ‘with effect from the start of his employment, any unused holiday would be recorded and any unused entitlement would roll forward each year.’
He added: ‘I find that it was agreed between (Mr Ageli) and (Sabtina) that he would be paid for his holiday as and when needed or at the end of his employment.
“I find that (Sabtina) did not have a genuine belief that (Mr Ageli) had committed gross misconduct.’
He said the company did not conduct a reasonable investigation or have reasonable grounds to conclude that Mr Ageli had committed gross misconduct.
“I find this because (Sabtina) was unwilling or unable to provide (Mr Ageli) with reasons for his dismissal shortly after he, in effect, asked for them’, the judge added.
He said the dismissal was ‘clearly procedurally unfair’.
Sabtina Ltd is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Libyan Foreign Investment Company (LAFICO) which in turn is a subsidiary of the Libyan Investment Authority.
Mr Ageli, who instructs in full contact karate, met wife Anisa whilst he was at college in Hastings, East Sussex.
Mrs Ageli, 71, told the Mail her husband had been a ‘very hard worker’ but the firm’s refusal to grant holiday requests resulted in the couple having to take separate breaks.
She added: ‘I would have to go away on holiday with the children but without him.
‘He was treated badly after working like that for them.’
