The Vento bands are the three tiers UK employment tribunals use to put a figure on injury to feelings in discrimination claims. For claims presented on or after 6 April 2026, awards run from £1,300 at the bottom of the lower band to £62,900 at the top of the upper band, with a narrow power to go higher in exceptional cases. The framework takes its name from the 2003 Court of Appeal decision in Vento v Chief Constable of West Yorkshire Police (No. 2) and is updated every April to reflect inflation.
The Three Bands and What Each One Covers
The structure has stayed the same since 2003: three bands reflecting the seriousness of the discrimination and, more importantly, the impact on the person who experienced it.
- Lower band is for less serious cases, typically an isolated incident or one-off occurrence — a single insensitive comment or a brief lapse in fair treatment that caused genuine upset without lasting consequences.
- Middle band is for serious cases that fall short of the worst. This often means repeated discriminatory behaviour over weeks or months, or a single act that caused profound and lasting distress.
- Upper band is reserved for the most serious cases: a sustained campaign of harassment, deliberate victimisation, or conduct severe enough to disrupt your career or personal life.
Victimisation claims, where an employer retaliates against someone for raising a discrimination complaint, use the same bands. So do claims about access to goods, services, and premises under the Equality Act, not only workplace disputes.1Equality and Human Rights Commission. How the Value of a Discrimination Claim Is Decided in England and Wales
Current Figures for 2026
The Presidents of the Employment Tribunals issue annual guidance adjusting the bands in line with the Retail Prices Index. For claims presented on or after 6 April 2026 the figures are:2Judiciary of the United Kingdom. Ninth Addendum to Presidential Guidance – Employment Tribunal Awards for Injury to Feelings and Psychiatric Injury
- Lower band: £1,300 to £12,600
- Middle band: £12,600 to £37,700
- Upper band: £37,700 to £62,900
A tribunal can exceed £62,900 in the most exceptional cases, though this power is used rarely. The figures that apply to your claim are those in force on the date the claim is presented. If you filed under the previous year’s guidance, the earlier figures apply, not the new ones.2Judiciary of the United Kingdom. Ninth Addendum to Presidential Guidance – Employment Tribunal Awards for Injury to Feelings and Psychiatric Injury
The Presidents have acknowledged shortcomings in RPI as a measure of inflation and have said they will consider switching to a different index if the Judicial College or the Employment Relations Act 1999 moves to one in future.2Judiciary of the United Kingdom. Ninth Addendum to Presidential Guidance – Employment Tribunal Awards for Injury to Feelings and Psychiatric Injury
How Tribunals Decide Where Your Case Sits
The assessment is objective in form but very personal in substance. What matters most is how the discrimination actually affected you. Two people treated identically by the same employer can end up in different bands because one was shaken for months and the other brushed it off.
Several factors tend to push awards upward. Duration is the clearest: a pattern of behaviour spanning months usually attracts more than a single incident. Vulnerability counts too. If you were already dealing with health problems, bereavement, or other hardship when the discrimination occurred, a tribunal recognises that the conduct likely hit harder.1Equality and Human Rights Commission. How the Value of a Discrimination Claim Is Decided in England and Wales
Context matters. Discrimination in front of colleagues or the public carries a stronger element of humiliation than something that happened behind closed doors. Language that was deliberately cruel or that touched on intimate aspects of your life tends to pull awards up. Physical effects, such as insomnia, anxiety symptoms, or needing counselling, can shift a claim into the middle or upper band.1Equality and Human Rights Commission. How the Value of a Discrimination Claim Is Decided in England and Wales
One point that catches claimants off guard: the focus is on the injury, not the wrongdoing. An employer can behave appallingly, but if you were particularly resilient and the conduct genuinely did not cause significant distress, the award reflects that lower level of injury. The reverse is also true. Conduct that looks minor on paper can attract a substantial award if the impact on the claimant was profound.
What Injury to Feelings Awards Actually Compensate
The Equality Act 2010 allows awards for “injured feelings” as part of any discrimination remedy, whether or not the claimant also recovers lost earnings or other financial harm.3Legislation.gov.uk. Equality Act 2010 – Section 119 It covers the full range of protected characteristics: age, disability, gender reassignment, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, sex, and sexual orientation.
This is a separate head of compensation. It sits apart from special damages (quantifiable losses like unpaid wages or pension shortfalls) and from personal injury claims that require a diagnosed psychiatric condition such as depression or PTSD. You can receive an injury to feelings award with no medical diagnosis at all. The award addresses the subjective experience of humiliation, distress, anxiety, and loss of dignity.
Because these awards are compensatory rather than punitive, the legal measure is the same as in a negligence claim: put the claimant back in the position they would have been in had the discrimination not happened.4Legislation.gov.uk. Equality Act 2010 – Explanatory Notes – Section 124 Unlike unfair dismissal, which carries a statutory cap, discrimination compensation has no upper limit, which is part of why the Vento bands matter so much as a consistency tool.
What Can Be Added on Top
A tribunal can make a separate award of aggravated damages in addition to the Vento band figure. These are uncommon. They arise when the employer’s conduct went beyond the discrimination itself, for example where the employer discriminated knowing it was unlawful, or acted in a dismissive or hostile way during the tribunal proceedings. Conduct during the legal process that made your distress worse can form the basis for an aggravated damages claim on top of the standard award.
Interest is also added, and the calculation is more generous for injury to feelings than for other heads. Interest on an injury to feelings award runs from the date of the discriminatory act all the way to the day the tribunal calculates the award. For other compensation such as lost earnings, interest runs only from the midpoint of that period. In cases that take a year or more to reach a hearing, that can add a meaningful sum. The applicable rate in England and Wales is the rate prescribed for the Special Investment Account under the Court Funds Rules.5Legislation.gov.uk. The Employment Tribunals (Interest on Awards in Discrimination Cases) Regulations 1996
Tax on the Award
Parliament amended the tax legislation to specify that while “injury” for income tax purposes includes psychiatric injury, it does not include injured feelings.6Legislation.gov.uk. Income Tax (Earnings and Pensions) Act 2003 – Section 403 So a pure injury to feelings award is not automatically tax-free.
Where the award forms part of a broader termination payment, it may fall within the £30,000 tax-free threshold for termination-related payments under section 403 of ITEPA 2003.6Legislation.gov.uk. Income Tax (Earnings and Pensions) Act 2003 – Section 403 If your employment ended and the award is bundled with other termination compensation, the combined total is tax-free up to £30,000, and anything above is taxed as income. If the discrimination claim is unconnected to a termination, the position is less straightforward and professional advice is worth the cost.
The Deadline That Can End the Claim Before It Starts
You have three months minus one day from the date of the discriminatory act to begin the claims process. For a continuing course of conduct such as ongoing harassment, time runs from the last incident in the series. Missing this deadline can bar the claim entirely.
Before you can file at the employment tribunal, you must notify ACAS to start early conciliation. This is mandatory for most discrimination claims. ACAS offers both sides a chance to resolve the dispute without a hearing, and the process can last up to 12 weeks.7Acas. How Early Conciliation Works
Notifying ACAS effectively pauses the deadline. If you contact them within the original time limit, you get at least one month from the date you receive your early conciliation certificate to file your ET1 tribunal claim form.7Acas. How Early Conciliation Works If conciliation does not produce an agreement, ACAS issues a certificate with a reference number you need for the claim form. Working out the exact deadline after conciliation can get fiddly, so keep careful track of dates from the moment you first consider a claim.