The Fair Work Act states that a person has, in effect, been dismissed if they resigned from their employment but were forced to do so because of conduct, or a course of conduct, engaged in by their employer. This is commonly known as constructive dismissal.

The definition of ‘conduct’ includes both an act and a failure to act, and includes situations in which the employee is effectively instructed to resign by the employer in the face of a threatened or impending dismissal, or the employee quits their job in response to conduct by the employer which gives them no reasonable choice but to resign.