CCMA awards in 2025: how much can an employer actually lose?
· 6 min read
When a dismissed employee refers a dispute to the CCMA, most small business owners assume the worst case is a few thousand rand and an uncomfortable afternoon. The reality is more expensive.
Under section 193 of the Labour Relations Act 66 of 1995, an arbitrator who finds a dismissal unfair may award compensation of up to 12 months' remuneration for an ordinary unfair dismissal. If the dismissal is found to be automatically unfair — because it was retaliatory, discriminatory, or related to protected activity — that ceiling rises to 24 months' remuneration.
The November 2025 Lewis v Van de Venter Mojapelo award came in at R310,571. That was an ordinary unfair dismissal, not an automatically unfair one. The employee earned a modest salary. The award was approximately ten months' remuneration, issued because the employer's procedural record was incomplete.
What "up to 12 months" actually means in practice
The ceiling is not the floor. Arbitrators calibrate the award to the circumstances, and a range of factors pull the number up or down.
Factors that increase the award:
- The employee had long service — a five-year employee dismissed on a procedural technicality will attract a higher award than a six-month employee
- The employer had no documentation — missing charge sheets, unsigned outcome letters, and absent hearing minutes all signal a cavalier approach to procedure
- The employer failed to appear or was poorly prepared at arbitration
- The employee genuinely struggled to find new work after dismissal
- The dismissal was related to a protected ground (race, gender, pregnancy, union membership, whistleblowing) — this tips the matter into automatically unfair territory and the 24-month ceiling applies
Factors that reduce the award:
- The employee found alternative employment quickly
- The substantive reason for the dismissal was sound — the employee genuinely committed the offence — and only the procedure was deficient
- The employer engaged honestly throughout and the procedural failures were minor
- The employee contributed to the breakdown of the relationship
An arbitrator who finds that the dismissal was substantively fair but only procedurally deficient — the employer had the right reason but followed the wrong process — may award as little as one or two months' compensation. This is sometimes called the "Sidumo discretion," derived from the Constitutional Court's 2007 Sidumo v Rustenburg Platinum Mines judgment, which established that arbitrators must assess fairness in context rather than apply automatic penalties.
But "as little as one or two months" is still material for a small business. On a salary of R20,000 per month, that is R20,000 to R40,000 in cash, plus the time and legal costs of the arbitration process itself.
The automatically unfair dismissal categories
Section 187 of the LRA lists the grounds on which a dismissal is automatically unfair, regardless of the employer's reasons or the procedure followed. These carry the 24-month ceiling and arbitrators treat them seriously.
A dismissal is automatically unfair if the reason is:
- The employee's participation in a strike or protected concerted action
- The employee's pregnancy, intended pregnancy, or any reason related to pregnancy
- Unfair discrimination on any ground listed in the Employment Equity Act — race, gender, sex, pregnancy, marital status, family responsibility, ethnic or social origin, colour, sexual orientation, age, disability, religion, HIV status, conscience, belief, political opinion, culture, language, or birth
- The employee's whistleblowing — disclosing information that the employee reasonably believed exposed wrongdoing by the employer
- The employee exercising any right conferred by the LRA, including union membership, collective bargaining, or participating in CCMA proceedings
Small employers who dismiss employees for attendance problems during or shortly after a pregnancy, or who let go of a union member who raised a grievance, are at significant risk of an automatically unfair dismissal finding. The 24-month ceiling applies even if the employer had a legitimate operational reason running alongside the protected reason — the protected reason only needs to be a reason, not the only reason.
The reinstatement risk
Compensation is not the only remedy. Section 193 of the LRA makes reinstatement the primary remedy for unfair dismissal. An arbitrator must order reinstatement or re-employment unless:
- The employee does not want to return
- The circumstances make continued employment intolerable
- It is not reasonably practicable for the employer to take the employee back
- The dismissal was unfair only because of a procedural defect
That third exception — "not reasonably practicable" — is narrower than employers expect. An arbitrator will not accept "we hired someone else" as a complete answer. If the position still exists in substance, reinstatement is on the table.
Reinstatement can be ordered retrospectively, from the date of dismissal. This means the employer may be liable for back pay — all salary the employee would have earned from the dismissal date to the date of the arbitration award — plus reinstatement into the position. For a matter that takes six months from referral to award, that is six months of back pay on top of everything else.
The CCMA process timeline
Understanding the timeline helps with financial planning. From the date of dismissal:
| Stage | Timeframe |
|---|---|
| Employee must refer the dispute | Within 30 days of dismissal |
| CCMA must schedule conciliation | Within 30 days of referral |
| Employee may request arbitration after failed conciliation | Within 90 days of certificate of non-resolution |
| CCMA must schedule arbitration | Within 21 days of arbitration request |
| Arbitrator must issue award | Within 14 days of conclusion of hearing |
In practice, the full process from dismissal to award takes four to eight months for a straightforward matter. Complex matters — multiple witnesses, voluminous documentation, legal representation — take longer.
During this entire period, the employer carries the uncertainty of a potential award on their books. For a business with thin margins and five employees, a R150,000 to R300,000 contingent liability is not abstract.
What happens if you do not attend
If the employer fails to appear at the arbitration without a valid reason, the arbitrator may proceed in the employer's absence. This is called an ex parte arbitration, and the award issued against an absent employer is typically at the higher end of the scale — the arbitrator has heard only the employee's version.
An ex parte award is enforceable as if it were a Labour Court order. The employee can apply to have it enforced through the sheriff, including attaching business assets.
The cost of getting it right versus the cost of getting it wrong
A properly run disciplinary hearing — notice of investigation, charge sheet, 48-hour notice of hearing, impartial chairperson, written minutes, written outcome, certificate of service — takes more time than a phone call or a WhatsApp message. For a small employer who has never done it before, it is genuinely daunting.
But the comparison is not between "spending time on paperwork" and "saving time." It is between spending two to three hours generating the correct documents and facing a potential R100,000 to R300,000 award plus arbitration costs six months later.
The procedural requirements under the Code of Good Practice: Dismissal (GN 3470, GG 53294, 4 September 2025) are not arbitrary bureaucracy. They exist because the arbitration system needs a paper trail to assess what actually happened. An employer who can produce a complete, timestamped, signed procedural file walks into arbitration in a fundamentally different position to one who cannot.
The documents are the defence.
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