A worker at Dan's Truck Detailing in Queensland was told she was no longer welcome at the business through a vile text message from her boss, after she was slow to reply to a question about another employee while working her second job. The Fair Work Commission found the dismissal was harsh, unjust and unreasonable, after the employer failed to respond to the case.
What the Commission decided
Deputy President Butler found that Nailani Lang was dismissed by text message sent by Dan Moawad, the contact person for the business, on 5 September 2025. The message told her she would never be allowed near the business again and was laced with abuse.
The trouble began the day before, when Mr Moawad texted and called Ms Lang asking about the whereabouts of another employee, who was his ex-partner. Ms Lang was working at her other part-time job at the time, a commitment her employer knew about, and could not respond straight away. Mr Moawad reacted by sending her an aggressive and disrespectful message, telling her to lose his number and swearing at her. When Ms Lang replied the same day to explain the delay and ask to be spoken to respectfully, she received a further abusive message the next day ending her employment.
The Commission found there was no valid reason for the dismissal connected to Ms Lang's conduct or performance. She had never been warned, counselled or told her job was at risk, and was given no chance to respond before she was sacked. The decision to end her employment was, in the Deputy President's words, capricious, delivered without procedural fairness and carried out immediately, using what the decision calls vile and abusive language.
The Commission also noted that because the business was small, with between one and fourteen employees, it likely lacked dedicated human resources expertise, which may have affected how the dismissal was handled. That counted for little, though: the decision records that small businesses without HR specialists are generally still capable of avoiding this kind of unreasonable conduct when ending someone's employment.
What was actually in dispute
There was, in truth, little for the Commission to decide on a contested basis, because the employer never showed up. The Fair Work Commission's Registry tried repeatedly to contact the business by phone, post and email over several months. Mr Moawad spoke to Registry staff once, in October 2025, and said he would file a response. He never did.
The Commission eventually confirmed, through Australia Post tracking, that an express post package containing the application had arrived at the business address. Combined with Mr Moawad's earlier phone contact, the Deputy President found the business had been properly served and was aware of the case. With no response filed and no attendance at the directions hearing, the Commission treated the application, and the facts in it, as uncontested. That meant the case was decided on the papers, without a hearing.
The only real legal question was whether the uncontested facts supported a finding of unfair dismissal under the criteria in section 387 of the Fair Work Act, covering things like whether there was a valid reason, whether the worker was warned, and whether she got a chance to respond. The Deputy President worked through each criterion and found they either did not arise, given there was no valid reason in the first place, or weighed in Ms Lang's favour.
What this means
The Commission has not yet decided what remedy Ms Lang will receive: a further hearing was flagged to deal with whether she should be reinstated or paid compensation. The decision is a reminder that an employer's failure to engage with the Fair Work Commission process does not make an unfair dismissal claim disappear; if anything, it can mean the matter is decided entirely on the worker's version of events. Readers wanting the basics on how these claims work, including who can bring one, can see unfair dismissal eligibility, and those running a small business can see how the size of an operation is factored into these decisions.