Fair Work Commission rules insurance broker's dismissal over title change was justified

The Fair Work Commission found that CCIB Services was justified in dismissing Foula Dendroulakis after she removed the word senior from her title in legal correspondence. The broker said the omission was an accident, but the commission treated the conduct as serious dishonesty. Australia's workplace umpire has warned employees after ruling that an insurance broker's decision to remove a word from her job title in legal correspondence justified her dismissal. The Fair Work Commission ruled on Friday that Foula Dendroulakis, who had worked at Victoria-based insurance company CCIB Services since 2021, was properly dismissed after she dropped the word senior from her role as account manager in formal correspondence. Dendroulakis, who described herself as a senior account manager, said she was remorseful and apologetic about her conduct. Dendroulakis was at odds with the company over seating arrangements, productivity and working from home when she wrote to the commission alleging she had been forced to take on a more senior job without more pay. In her correspondence, she did not include senior in her title. CCIB viewed that as an act of dishonesty and used it as grounds for dismissal. The commission upheld the dismissal, though in part because CCIB was a small business it did not examine whether the employers' beliefs were ultimately correct or whether the sacking was harsh. CCIB declined to comment. When Dendroulakis started at CCIB, her employment contract labelled her only as an account manager. The company said she was recruited to a senior account manager position and paid accordingly, and that her business cards and email signature reflected this. Dendroulakis also referred to herself as a senior account manager, including on LinkedIn. In 2022 she sought a pay rise in which she referred to herself as a senior account manager. She was given a pay increase along with her position description labelling her as such. The conflict escalated in 2025. Director Kurt Alder decided Dendroulakis was not productive while working from home. When she was in the office, he concluded she was spending lots of time on personal calls in the boardroom during the work day. On one occasion, Alder said she had left the office early and did not return. When co-director Ryan Fisher raised the issue, he said Dendroulakis kept changing her story. She initially said she left early to take a lunch break, then said she was too busy and worked from her phone in her car. In a later email, she said she had left early to allow extra time to arrive at a client's premises because of poor weather. Later that year, CCIB altered seating arrangements in the office. Dendroulakis raised concern about the temperature of the location allocated to her and its effect on her ability to focus and work efficiently. She said that, as a senior team member, she would appreciate an opportunity to discuss an alternative seat, a private office arrangement, or a work from home agreement for two days a week. The company said it would not be revisiting the desk issue. It said her productivity metrics did not support working two days from home. In what the commission called a lengthy response, Dendroulakis then expressed concern about the job title in her employment contract. CCIB acknowledged the word senior had accidentally been omitted from the contract and said it had no concerns about formally changing her title. The same month, Dendroulakis was issued a first and final warning about her inability to perform effectively while working from home. In December 2025, Dendroulakis made a legal claim with the commission. She alleged the firm had changed her role without a lawful basis or more pay. She claimed she had been underpaid and was required to perform duties of a senior account manager when her title was account manager. Dendroulakis attached a copy of a letter she had previously sent to the company around the time of her pay rise, but removed the word senior from her job title in the document. CCIB also received a copy of her claim and noticed the omission. Dendroulakis said she had removed the word as a reflexive correction in line with her employment agreement, that it was not deliberate, and that she had not intended to mislead the commission. Her lawyers said she was sincerely remorseful and apologetic for the oversight, and that significant work-related stress and anxiety had affected her attention to detail. Fisher gave evidence that Dendroulakis had become a liability to the business and its workplace and had been blatantly dishonest on more than one occasion. Alder claimed her conduct was effectively fraud designed to bolster her claims, mislead the commission and falsely support her general protections claim. The commission said Dendroulakis' conduct was sufficiently serious, with the employer holding a genuine belief on reasonable grounds about the gravity of the conduct, for immediate dismissal to be justified.