The U.K. Employment Tribunal has called into question Cadwalader Wickersham & Taft's bonus policy, stating that it "put women at a particular disadvantage when compared with men."

Though the tribunal dismissed the claim for indirect sex discrimination brought by a female associate at the firm's London office, it agreed with her that women at the firm were disadvantaged by its policy of not reducing its hours targets for annual bonuses to reflect time spent on holiday.

In this case, however, the tribunal ruled that the firm's policy was "a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim," tribunal documents show.

The tribunal heard that the associate had returned from maternity leave in 2018. She was entitled to seven days of statutory leave for the remaining 16 weeks of the year.

This, the firm's counsel successfully argued, amounted to a daily target of 8.6 billable hours in order to achieve her bonus if she took the full seven days.

The tribunal ultimately ruled that the claimant could have taken her statutory minimum annual leave of seven days and still obtained her bonus, stating that she had a choice between "taking very generous holiday leave or working more to improve her chance of obtaining the bonus."

The claimant's application for a reconsideration was refused "on the basis that it has no reasonable prospects of success."

Cadwalader did not respond immediately to requests for comment.