Complainant

Respondent

Parties

Mairead  Buckley

Hse

Representatives

Olajide Ogidan Forsa Trade Union

David Beegan Human Resources Department, Dublin South

Act

Complaint/Dispute Reference No.

Date of Receipt

Complaint seeking adjudication by the Workplace Relations Commission under section 6 of the Payment of Wages Act, 1991

CA-00069748-001

05/03/2025

The Complainant was promoted from her position as a Grade V to a Grade VI Officer with effect from 28 September 2020. She subsequently had deductions made from her salary which started on pay date 14 November 2014 in respect of alleged overpayments and her yearly increments were deferred by two years. 

The Complainant applied for a job evaluation and was successfully regraded from Grade V to Grade VI, following which she was issued a new contract on 28 October 2020. The contract clearly stated that she would be placed on the 6th point of the scale, i.e., €57,337. Both parties signed the contract, and she was paid accordingly.

On 28 November 2023—more than three years after signing the new contract—she was informed that she had been overpaid by €3,353.71. The Respondent claimed that this overpayment was identified during a review. Such reviews were carried out annually, meaning reviews would have taken place in 2020, 2021, and 2022 without detecting any anomaly in her pay.

Despite the Complainant disputing the alleged overpayment, and despite local HR supporting her position, the Respondent began deducting the claimed overpayments from her wages in instalments without her consent from pay date 14 November 2024.

In addition, her annual increments for 2023 and 2024 were deferred, a measure she asserts was unlawful.

The Respondent stated that the rate of pay included in the Complainant’s contract, namely €57,337 the pay rate attached to the 6th point of the grade VI scale, was incorrect because HR Circular 10/71 states that “where the minimum of the new scale is less than the existing pay, the employee may enter the new scale at the point nearest but not below existing pay plus one increment and b) in any other case the date of promotion shall be the new incremental date, (vi) above applies, has been on a fixed salary or on the maximum of his/her existing salary for at least three years at the date of his/her promotion or new appointment, he/she may enter the new scale in accordance with the appropriate provision and with a further additional increment, but in that case the date of promotion or new appointment will be the employee’s new incremental date”

Therefore, in accordance with HR Circular 10/71, instead of being placed directly on LSI 1—namely the 6th point of the Grade VI scale—the Complainant’s contractual salary should have been €55,365, corresponding to the 5th point on the Grade VI salary scale, for the period from 28 October 2020 to 28 October 2022. She should then have been moved to the 6th point of the scale on 28 October 2022, with one year accrued toward LSI counting as an additional increment.

The Law:

Section 5 of the Payment of Wages Act, 1991 states;

a) a deduction made by an employer from the wages of an employee, or any payment received from an employee by an employer, where—

(i) the purpose of the deduction or payment is the reimbursement of the employer in respect of—

(I) any overpayment of wages, or

(II) any overpayment in respect of expenses incurred by the employee in carrying out his employment,

made (for any reason) by the employer to the employee, and

(ii) the amount of the deduction or payment does not exceed the amount of the overpayment,

(6) “Where-

• (a)The total amount of any wages that are paid on any occasion by an employer to an employee is less than the total amount of wages that is properly payable by him to the employee on that occasion (after making any deductions therefrom that fall to be made4 and are in accordance with this Act), or
  • (b)None of the wages that are properly payable to an employee by an employer on any occasion (after making any such deductions as aforesaid) are paid to the employee,

then, except in so far as the deficiency or non-payment is attributable to an error of computation, the amount of the deficiency or non-payment shall be treated as a deduction made by the employer from the wages of the employee on the occasion.”

Findings:

To ground a claim under the Payment of Wages Act, 1991, the wages concerned must be properly payable. The Labour Court has found previously in Department of Public Expenditure v. Brian Collins, PW/18/14 and in Aer Lingus v. Matchett, PW/18/18, that an error in a contract does not mean that the rate of pay set out in the contract is properly payable.

Having regard to the submissions of both parties, and having carefully reviewed Department of Health HR Circular 10/71, I am satisfied that the rate of pay set out in the Complainant’s contract arose from an administrative error and was not properly payable.

Specifically, in accordance with the provisions of HR Circular 10/71, the Complainant should have been paid €55,365—the 5th point on the Grade VI salary scale—upon her promotion on 28 October 2020, rather than €57,337, which corresponds to the 6th point on the scale, as point 6 constitutes an LSI.

Accordingly, I find that the deductions, which began on pay date 14 November 2024 in respect of the overpayments from 28 October 2020 to when they were discovered in November 2023, were valid in accordance with section 5(5) above. I also find that there was no breach of the Act by the Respondent in respect of the deferral of the Complainant’s increment by two years.

I therefore find that the complaint is not well founded.

I find that the complaint is not well founded for the reasons set out above.