The formal process: acknowledgement, the Sanction Lock & imposing a sanction

What this guide covers

Working a formal incident from raised to closed on the Incident Detail screen — the right-to-reply status, the Sanction Lock, and how a sanction officer imposes a sanction once it's allowed.

Who can do this: viewing needs incident-create / sanction / HR-admin (with row-level scope); imposing a sanction needs the sanction permission (or HR-admin). Sensitive — confidential.

The detail screen

It shows the full picture for one incident:

The document — employee, who raised it, category, incident date, the objective facts, and evidence attachments.
Right to Reply (audi alteram partem) — the acknowledgement status:
- Awaiting employee acknowledgement (with a deadline countdown), or
- Acknowledged (with the timestamp, the employee's typed confirmation, and integrity details), or
- 24h window expired — no acknowledgement.
Sanction — the control to impose a sanction, shown only when allowed (see below).
Audit timeline — an append-only log of every step.

The Sanction Lock

This is the heart of fair process:

While the incident is Pending Employee Acknowledgement, the sanction control is locked — you'll see "Sanction locked. A formal sanction cannot be issued until the employee acknowledges the incident or the 24-hour right-to-reply window expires."
The lock releases automatically when the employee acknowledges, or when the 24-hour window expires — the incident then becomes Ready for Sanction.
The lock is enforced by the system, not just hidden in the screen — it can't be bypassed.

Imposing a sanction

Once Ready for Sanction, a user with sanction authority sees the sanction form:

Choose a sanction level on the disciplinary ladder — Verbal Warning, First Written Warning, Final Written Warning, or Dismissal Hearing.
Add sanction notes.
Impose Sanction & Close — the incident closes with that level recorded.

If you hold only the create permission (no sanction authority), you'll instead see a note that the window is closed and a sanction officer must now act — a deliberate separation of duties.

Other actions

Amend facts — only before the employee has engaged (pre-acknowledgement). After that, the facts are frozen.
Withdraw — soft-deletes the incident (with a reason, audited) if it shouldn't proceed; only before a sanction.
The private reply thread — the employee's case is captured in a thread with HR; the raising manager cannot see it. HR can read it for fairness.

Good to know

Don't wait at the lock unnecessarily — it releases on acknowledgement or at 24h; the dashboard shows what's stuck.
Separation of duties is intentional — the person who raises isn't necessarily the person who sanctions.
Everything is on the timeline — it's your defensible record.

Raising an incident — the step before this.
If an incident is raised about you — what the employee does to acknowledge.
Incident dashboard (HR) — spotting incidents stuck awaiting acknowledgement.