Complainant

Respondent

Parties

Vanessa  Clarke

Bornodal Limited

Representatives

Self-Represented

Self-Represented

Act

Complaint/Dispute Reference No.

Date of Receipt

Complaint seeking adjudication by the Workplace Relations Commission under Section 39 of the Redundancy Payments Act, 1967

CA-00059697-001

31/10/2023

The Complainant commenced employment with the Respondent on 3rd March 2008. The Complainant was a permanent, full-time member of staff, in receipt of an average weekly wage of €481.25. The Complainant’s employment is ongoing, albeit under an alternative legal entity.

On 31st October 2023, the Complainant referred the present complaint to the Commission. Herein, she stated that her employment had transferred to numerous cooperate entities during her engagement. In this regard, she submitted that her most recent employer has asserted that her commencement date is 17th September 2023. In such circumstances, she submitted that the was entitled to a redundancy payment from her former employers. While the Respondent made no submission in relation to this allegation, they stated that they were the Complainant’s former employers. In this regard, they submitted that her contract of employment had transferred to an alternative entity on 16th November 2022, well before the date of the alleged redundancy.

A hearing in relation to this matter was convened for, and finalized on, 8th March 2024. This hearing was conducted by way of remote hearing pursuant to the Civil Law and Criminal Law (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2020 and SI 359/20206, which designates the WRC as a body empowered to hold remote hearings. No technical issues were experienced by either side during the hearing.

In circumstances whereby no material dispute exists as to a core factual point, no witness evidence was taken from the parties.

By submission, the Complainant stated that she commenced employment in March 2008. Some three and a half years later, in December 2021, the Complainant’s employment was transferred to the Respondent entity.

Thereafter, the Complainant continued to work for the Respondent organisation from 6th December 2021. The Complainant submitted that her employment was subject to a further transfer of undertakings, this time without her contemporaneous knowledge, on 16th November 2022. Some time later, on 7th September 2023, the Complainant received notice that the business was to receive yet another set of owners. While these owners agreed to maintain the Complainant as an employee, they stated that they would only do so on the basis that the Complainant’s commencement date was recorded as 17th September 2023.

Having regard to the foregoing sequence of events, the Complainant submitted that her contract of employment had been broken and that she had been left in limbo. 

By response, the Respondent submitted that they had been the Complainant’s employer until 16th November 2022. They submitted that on this date, the Respondent business was sold to an entirely separate corporate entity, and that the Complainant’s employment duly transferred to that entity.

In this regard, the Respondent submitted that they were not the Complainant’s employer on the date of the alleged redundancy, and that they had not been the Complainant’s employer for some time previous to the same.

Regarding the instant case, the Complainant has submitted that she is entitled to a statutory redundancy payment on foot of a new employer asserting that her employment was not continuous following an apparent transfer of undertakings.

While it is unsurprising that the Complainant has taken issue with the position adopted by these new owners, it is common case that the impleaded Respondent is neither the alleged transferee nor transferor in this regard. From the sequence of events agreed by the parties, it is apparent that the Complainant transferred into the employment of the Respondent in 2021 and subsequently transferred out of the same in 2022, some time prior to the alleged redundancy.

Having regard to the foregoing, it is apparent that the Complainant’s cause of action regarding her alleged redundancy does not accrue against the impleaded Respondent. As a consequence of the foregoing, I find that her complaint is not well-founded and her appeal fails.

I find that the complaint is not well-founded and the appeal fails.

Redundancy, Transfer