Complainant

Respondent

Parties

Pavol  Marticek

Galway Mf Catering Ltd.

Act

Complaint/Dispute Reference No.

Date of Receipt

Complaint seeking adjudication by the Workplace Relations Commission under section 27 of the Organisation of Working Time Act, 1997

CA-00045122-001

09/07/2021

The complainant submits that he did not receive his annual leave when he left his employment.  The respondent did not attend the hearing.

The hearing was heard remotely, pursuant to the Civil Law and Criminal Law (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act, 2020 and S.I. 359/2020, which designated the Workplace Relations Commission as a body empowered to hold remote hearings.

Parties in attendance were advised that following the delivery of a judgement of the Supreme Court in Zalewski v Adjudication Officer and WRC, Ireland and the Attorney General [2021] IESC 24 that this hearing before the Workplace Relations Commission would be held in public and that this decision would not be anonymised and there was no objection to same.

Parties were also advised that an Adjudication Officer may take evidence under oath or affirmation and that cross examination is permitted.  Evidence was taken under oath from the complainant.

The complainant submits that he commenced employment on 18 November 2020 and that he left employment with the respondent on 6 June 2021.  His weekly wage was €623.00 and his evidence under oath was that he never received his holiday pay when he left employment.

The complainant submitted that he made contact with the respondent but received no response.

The respondent did not attend and did not make contact with the WRC.  I am satisfied that the respondent was on notice of the hearing and find their failure to attend unexplained.

The complainant submits that he was not paid his annual leave entitlement when he left his employment.  The respondent did not attend and I find their failure to attend unexplained and I am satisfied that they were on notice of the hearing.

Section 19 of the Act provides:

19. Entitlement to annual leave (1) Subject to the First Schedule (which contains transitional provisions in respect of the leave years 1996 to 1998), an employee shall be entitled to paid annual leave (in this Act referred to as “annual leave”) equal to— (a) 4 working weeks in a leave year in which he or she works at least 1,365 hours (unless it is a leave year in which he or she changes employment), (b) one-third of a working week for each month in the leave year in which he or she works at least 117 hours, or (c) 8 per cent of the hours he or she works in a leave year (but subject to a maximum of 4 working weeks): Provided that if more than one of the preceding paragraphs is applicable in the case concerned and the period of annual leave of the employee, determined in accordance with each of those paragraphs, is not identical, the annual leave to which the employee shall be entitled shall be equal to whichever of those periods is the greater.

As the respondent did not attend the only evidence I can rely on is that of the complainants.  The complainant gave evidence that he did not receive a contract of employment and that he asked the respondent on at least 2 occasions to forward him his outstanding payment.  Details were provided by the complainant of his revenue account as there were no pay slips but it was unclear from this if any annual leave was paid.

Based on all the evidence I find that the complainant during his employment worked on average 46 hours per week and was not paid annual leave during that time. 

I find that his outstanding annual leave during his 29 weeks employment, subject to “one-third of a working week for each month in the leave year in which he or she works at least 117 hours” is €1,454.

I find that the complaint is well founded and order the respondent to pay the complainant €1,454.

Annual leave, respondent did not attend