Employment tribunal claims are about to surge — the 2026–27 timeline every employer should have in the diary
The employment tribunal system is already at record load. In the third quarter of 2025/26, single claims were up 61% year on year, and the open caseload across single and multiple claims passed half a million. The system disposed of fewer than half the claims it received — the backlog is growing by thousands of cases every quarter, and the average time from claim to resolution has stretched past a year.
That is the starting point. The Employment Rights Act 2025, which received Royal Assent in December 2025, now adds two changes that materially expand who can claim and when:
October 2026 (expected): the claim window doubles
The time limit for bringing most tribunal claims is expected to extend from three months to six. Every workplace dispute stays "live" for twice as long — and decisions to claim that currently die at the three-month deadline will survive it.
January 2027 (expected): the two-year rule falls to six months
The qualifying period for unfair dismissal is expected to drop from two years to six months. Millions of employees who currently cannot bring an unfair dismissal claim become able to. Employers who lean on the two-year rule during probation and early tenure lose that protection almost entirely.
The compounding effect: more people eligible to claim × twice as long to decide × a tribunal system already a year behind. Employment risk is about to be repriced for every UK employer — and most of the market is pricing it blind.
What this means, by seat
- Employers and HR: dismissal and grievance decisions made from mid-2026 onwards carry a longer tail and a wider eligible population. Track-record data on how disputes in your sector actually resolve at tribunal becomes a planning input, not a curiosity.
- Employment lawyers: claim volumes rise on a statutory schedule. Firms that can show clients sector-specific exposure data — who gets claimed against, for what, with what outcomes — will win the pitches.
- Insurers and brokers: employment practices liability is being underwritten today on assumptions calibrated to the old regime. The loss environment changes twice in six months.
The data problem — and what we're doing about it
Published tribunal decisions (132,000+ since February 2017) tell you how litigated cases end. But most claims settle through Acas and never produce a published decision — so judgment data alone systematically understates exposure. The missing layer is the hearing lists: who was scheduled to appear, when — including the cases that later settled. Those lists are published daily and then vanish; nobody keeps them.
Polkey archives both, every day: every published decision, structured; every hearing list, preserved. Same-day alerts when a name you watch appears, and sector exposure reports with the settlement caveat handled honestly rather than ignored.