McDonald’s in a pickle over cheese slice firing
THE HAGUE (AFP) – A Dutch branch of McDonald’s was wrong to fire a worker for giving a colleague an extra piece of cheese on a hamburger, a court ruled on Tuesday.
“The dismissal was too severe a measure,” the district court in Leeuwarden in the north of the Netherlands said in a written judgment.
“It is just a slice of cheese.”
A written warning would have been a more appropriate punishment, said the court, which ordered McDonald’s to pay the worker the salary for the remaining five months of her contract — a total of 4,265.47 euros (6,006.69 dollars).
The company was also ordered to pay court costs.
The worker was fired at a McDonald’s branch in the northern town of Lemmer in March last year for giving a colleague on a break a more expensive cheese burger instead of the hamburger she had paid for.
McDonald’s maintained she had broken the rules, which prohibit any free gifts to family, friends or colleagues.
