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An employee's private chat about a colleague went beyond any "ordinary level of workplace gossip or venting", and was a "hateful" exchange that warranted her immediate dismissal, the Fair Work Commission has ruled.

Commissioner Paul Schneider rejected that the employee's comments were "harmless jokes" or "a form of endearment simply executed in a vulgar manner"; rather, they were "cruel and menacing", and posed a serious and imminent risk to the colleague's safety.

The McLernons Business Base sales employee was sacked for serious misconduct in November last year, after the employer discovered she had made "violent and threatening" comments about the colleague to another staff member over Microsoft Teams...