Complainant

Respondent

Anonymised Parties

A General Manager of a Restaurant

A limited liability Company

Representatives

Ciaran Tansey Damien Tansey Solicitors

none 

Act

Complaint/Dispute Reference No.

Date of Receipt

Complaint seeking adjudication by the Workplace Relations Commission under section 24 of the National Minimum Wage Act, 2000

CA-00026422-001

20/02/2019

Seven complaints in Adj. 19856 are brought alongside one other complaint in Adj. 19951. Therefore, a total of 8 complaints are being brought by a former general manager of a restaurant in Sligo against owner of the said restaurant, personally.

In the present cases (which are linked to the above complaints) Adj. 19860 and Adj. 19948, the same eight complaints are brought against the company which the present Respondent says was the employer of the Complainant.

The Complainant brought the eight complaints against two different Respondents because he was unsure as to who his employer was in circumstances where he was hired by the present Respondent in his individual capacity but 7 weeks into his employment, a pay slip issued to him which identified a limited liability company as the employer.

A preliminary ruling is necessary to identify who the employer of the complainant was. Once that ruling is made then the complaints as against the non-employing party are dismissed for want of jurisdiction.

Identifying the Employer

The Respondent is a company owned by a business man who owns several companies which operate eight separate restaurant businesses.

The company owner hired the Complainant in September 2018 as general manager of a restaurant business that was due to open in Sligo.

At the time of hiring the restaurant was not fully constructed and for the first 8 weeks of his employment the Complainant helped with the construction work of the premises and from 15 November until his employment was terminated on 16 December 2018, he worked as a general manager of the Restaurant.

In relation to who employed the Complainant, he contends that the employment contract was formed with the owner and that some 8 weeks into the employment (for the first time) he issued him with a payslip along with his pay. The name of a company was on the payslip. This was the first time that the Complainant heard of the company. He had no contract in writing and he did not know who his employer was. Therefore, he still is uncertain as to whether it was the Respondent personally or the company cited on the payslip to was his employer.

When the Complainant was hired by the Respondent he left a job in the UK in which he was earning a higher salary. He left the UK as he wished to return to Ireland.

CA-00026422-001

The Complainant states that due to excessive amount of hours worked, his weekly pay of €600 when averaged out over the hours worked this resulted in receiving €7.54 per hour, lower than the national minimum wage.

CA-00026422-001

This complaint is denied although the Respondent was not in a position to evidence the records to show the hours that he says the Complainant worked.

Identity of Employer

I am satisfied as a matter of probability that the contract of employment was formed between the Respondent as an individual and the Complainant. The Complainant started to work for the Respondent in early September 2018. It has not been denied by the Respondent that the first time that there was any reference to the limited liability company was in the form of a pay slip issued to the Complainant 8 weeks into the job. I therefore find as a matter of fact that the employer was the Respondent as an individual and not the Respondent cited in this complaint. The claims in the linked cases against the limited liability company are dismissed for want of jurisdiction as the company was not the employer.