Complainant

Respondent

Anonymised Parties

A Security Officer

A Security Company

Representatives

Appeared in Person

 Solicitor.

Act

Dispute Reference No.

Date of Receipt

Complaint seeking adjudication by the Workplace Relations Commission under section 13 of the Industrial Relations Act, 1969

CA-00017725-002

01/03/2018

This case concerns the claimants experience in his employment as a Security Officer which spanned an 11-year period. In his complaint form, he raised many operational issues concerning his pay and rostering. The Employer denied the claim. The Claimant represented himself, while the Employer was represented by a Solicitor and the Human Resource Manager.

The Claimant commenced work as a Security Officer on 15 March 2007 and left on 19 January 2018.He worked a 36-38-hour week. He submitted his complaint under Bullying and Harassment procedures.

In his written outline of the case, the claimant submitted that he had experienced a worsening of his work conditions over the past few years in the areas of pay and rostering. He outlined his concerns regarding late notification in rostering, an unannounced policy on “refused shifts “and supplemented this at hearing when he submitted that he had not been paid for over-time worked prior to his termination of employment.

The Claimant submitted that he had been dissatisfied by the repeated random calls seeking him to undertake additional hours between 2015-2017. He had previously agreed payment on overtime in 2014.He raised the non-payment of overtime but only received a late payment of 91 euro. He has only undertaken the overtime in support of his colleagues who were understaffed at the time.

The Employer confirmed that the claimant had worked from March 15, 2007 when he signed a contract of employment which incorporated a grievance procedure, which had never been used during his employment. The Company employs over 1,000 employees

The Respondent had resolved a pay issue with the claimant to the tune of 1800 euro in 2014.

After his employment, he did raise an issue about alleged outstanding pay. This was referred to the Human Resource Director and Payroll and the sum of 91 euro was forwarded.

The Employer denied that a complaint of bullying had been made out in the workplace or that the claimant had raised any issues on changes in notification of duties.

The Employer sought that the Adjudicator refrain from recommendation in the case. They submitted that the claimant had knowledge of how overtime payments were resolved and paid during employment. On this occasion, the company applied the 6-month window of obligation to pay as provided for in the Payment of Wages Act and had no further obligation to the claimant. They argued that the claim was lodged post-employment.

I have considered both the claimants and employers submissions in this case. Firstly, I am struck by the longevity in the employment relationship. Things seems to deteriorate over the past two years. I accept that most of the claim form was dedicated to operational issues surrounding how shifts and allocated shifts were allocated and recourse, if any for an employee when an issue was raised on these shifts. My role as an Adjudicator here is to investigate and determine if a dispute has arisen. However, I deem it vital that issues be at least discussed in the workplace prior to referral to the WRC. Then at least valuable groundwork has been completed and differences identified and submitted for external formal assessment.

In this case, I agree with the employer that bullying was not raised at work and now the contract has ceased between the parties. I do not find any merit in this aspect of the dispute. I advised the claimant at hearing regarding the parameters and usefulness of a Grievance procedure going forward.I am satisfied that the Employer had such a document in reach of the claimant .

I have then considered the unpaid overtime. Here, I found the January 12, 2018 email submitted by the claimant to be useful. This was submitted as part of his notification of his intention to leave the company one week later. It referred to a preparation for his departure and requested that unused holidays and unpaid overtime hours from October 2014 be placed in his last paycheque. I find that this request was made while in active employment.

I probed the claimant as to why he delayed before actioning the request for payment for hours worked? . There was no dispute between the parties on the quantum of hours worked or the subsequent calculations. The Complainant told me that he assumed that it was permissible to claim payment on cessation of work and he had just done the overtime to assist his colleagues as they were under pressure.

I then considered the argument extended by the Employer, that the claim had come so late in the day that it should be reduced by the time limits of the Payment of Wages Act. I found this to be an overly strict approach, given the request for payment was made in real time employment. I found a certain lack of transparency and explanation on the 91.00-euro payment to the claimant.

The Employer must carry the lion’s share of the responsibility for paying overtime and while I found omissions in both party’s actions, I found that the claimant has left employment without his correct payments and some consideration for restoration is needed on an equitable basis.

I have found merit in this aspect of the Dispute.

I have found merit in one aspect of this Dispute. While I have reservations that this matter could glide for many years before actioning a claim, I find that there was a shortfall in the claimant’s overtime payments received on his termination of employment.

I recommend:

1.       That the Employer make a payment of 500 euros to the claimant in full and final settlement of the claim within 6 weeks of this recommendation. This is to the unique circumstances surrounding this claim.

2.       That the Employer also introduces an annual/quarterly review to ensure overtime payments are made in as proximate a time frame to the work completed as possible within 6 weeks of this recommendation.

Staff Relation/Over time payment.