He has been on vacation for 15 years and is suing his company for not increasing his salary

A worker at a tech company who has been on sick leave for 15 years and has now sued the company for discrimination: He says they won’t raise his salary.

Ian Clifford said he was the victim of disability discrimination by IBM because his salary had not increased in the 15 years he had been on leave. With an IBM health plan, the computer scientist earns more than £54,000 a year ($67,000) and receives a guaranteed salary until age 65, meaning he’ll pocket more than £1.5 million ($1.9 million).

However. Clifford argued that he was not “generous enough”. He said his salary of £54,028 would “wither” over time due to inflation.

Clifford, who studied at King’s College London, started working for Lotus Development in 2000, before IBM brought him on board. He took sick leave in September 2008 and was still out of work in 2013 when he filed the lawsuit.

The origin of an unusual case

Clifford complained that he hadn’t received a pay raise or vacation for five years. In April 2013, when Clifford was in his early 30s, a “compromise agreement” was reached and his grievances resolved. including him in the company’s disability plan.

Under the plan, a person unable to work is not fired, but remains an employee and has “no obligation to work”. it was said at the hearing. Until recovery, retirement or early death, the employee covered by the plan has the right to collect 75% of the agreed income.

In Clifford’s case, his agreed salary was $90,000 a year, meaning that as of 2013, he would be earning $67,000 a year after the 25% deduction.. The plan lasted more than 30 years until he reached retirement age at 65, meaning he’ll receive a total of more than $1.9 million.

He was also paid $10,000 to settle his vacation grievances in 2013 and promised not to file complaints about the same issues again. However, in February 2022, Clifford took IBM to employment tribunal with new disability discrimination complaints that mirrored his previous complaint.

He declared that he had received “unfavorable” treatment, with no salary increase since 2013 or entitlement to holidays, and compared to a non-disabled employee who would have been paid full wages during vacation.

Clifford said that with current inflation above 10%, “the value of payments would soon run out”.. And he added: “The objective of the plan was to give security to employees who could not work, which would not have been achieved by freezing wages forever.”