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A CEO's failure to verify serious misconduct allegations before confirming a senior employee's dismissal "borders on negligence", the Fair Work Commission has found.

In awarding the employee nearly $51k in compensation for unfair dismissal, Commissioner Scott Connolly said if the employer had "bothered to test its facts", her employment might not have ended.

In August last year, the Health Care Providers Association financial controller was instructed to negotiate a new payment plan for the employer's ATO debts.

After doing so, and advising the CEO and COO of the new plan, she manually scheduled a $100k pre-payment to be made on 15 September. She didn't first seek approval from the CEO or COO, believing they had already agreed to the arrangement...