Email costs BG £101,000

Watch what you say in your company emails - it could get you sued, as gas industry heavyweight BG found to its cost. Andrew Duffield has successfully sued his ex-employer, BG, for defamation of character in an email circulated to all employees. He was awarded £101,000 compensation in the High Court this week. Duffield was the head of engineering at BG from the time it was formed when British Gas split into two companies in 1997. He set up Exoteric Gas Solutions to compete with the BG subsidiary Transco, but soon found the relationship with Transco difficult. EGS depended on Transco for market information, but after 12 weeks in business EGS was cut off from this information supply. It transpired that a 'highly defamatory' email had been sent to each of Transco's 10,000 staff instructing them to quit dealings with Duffield and EGS. Duffield accepted the £101,000 settlement in court yesterday, but his solicitor said that no apology had yet been offered. ®