The primary remedy for a substantively unfair dismissal is
reinstatement, which aims to place an employee into the position he
or she would have held had it not been for the substantively unfair
dismissal.
Generally speaking, reinstatement awards are coupled with orders
for back pay, that is, payment of the remuneration that the
employee would have enjoyed over the period between the dismissal
and the reinstatement order. This is calculated on the basis of the
terms and conditions that the employee was subject to at the date
of dismissal.
However, in the period between the dismissal and the
reinstatement order, an employee could conceivably have been
promoted, been given an increase or had any other form of benefit
applied to him or her. This is particularly the case where the
resolution of an unfair dismissal dispute takes a long time to
conclude.
