It’s a simple slip-up of the tech age that has become so universal Irish comedian David O’Doherty has even written a song about it.

But for one Perth woman, it has meant the end of a $95,000 a year job.

Dragon Mountain Gold employee Louise Nesbitt was sacked in January 2014 after she sent a message to her boss calling him a “complete dick”.

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The text was meant for someone else, and when she realised what she’d done, she immediately texted her boss, Robert Gardner, saying: “Rob please delete without reading. I am so so so sorry. Xxx.”

A third email implored Mr Gardner to disregard the message, saying: “Rob I need to explain … that message came across so wrong. Rob … that is not how I feel. My sense of humour is to exaggerate. It is not how I feel.”

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However, later in the same text she included a barb that did not help her cause: “Yes I do feel that my ideas are all ignored but that’s ok it’s not my building and all I can do is put forward suggestions and hope one or two get implemented.”

Ms Nesbitt was sacked two days later.

She then took the case to the Fair Work Commission, but the Commission has now agreed with Mr Gardner that the text message qualified as “gross misconduct”, and that her boss was within his rights to sack her immediately.

In its judgment, the Commission described the text message as “highly offensive, derogatory and a shock given Ms Nesbitt’s position as an employee and the long working relationship.”

Analysing the language of the text, the Commission concluded: “To call a person a ‘dick’ is a derogatory term to describe them as an idiot or fool. The word ‘complete’ is used to convey the message that the person is, without exception, an idiot or fool — they are nothing less than a ‘dick’.”

The Fair Work Commission’s ruling will set a precedent for future cases, strengthening the arm of insulted and abused bosses in the digital age.