TED2622

TE/24/45

DECISION  NO. TED2622

O'REGAN SITE DUMPERS LTD

AND

JEKATERINA ZABOROVSHAJA

(REPRESENTED BY NEAL HORGAN BL,
INSTRUCTED BY MCCOY SOLICITORS)

DIVISION:

Chairman:	Ms Connolly
Employer Member:	Ms Bisiwe
Worker Member:	Ms Treacy

SUBJECT:

Appeal of Adjudication Officer Decision No.: ADJ-00041468 (CA-00052472-002)

BACKGROUND:

The Employer appealed the Decision of the Adjudication Officer to the Labour Court on the 29 April 2024 in accordance with Section 8 (1) of the Terms of Employment (Information) Act 1994.  A Labour Court hearing took place on the 01 September 2026. 

The following is the Decision of the Court.

DECISION:

The is an appeal by O’Regan Site Dumpers Ltd (hereafter “the Respondent”) against a decision of an Adjudication Officer in a complaint made by a former employee, Jekaterina Zaborovshaja (hereafter “the Complainant”), under the Terms of Employment (Information) Act, 1994 (“the Act”).

The Adjudication Officer held that the complaint was well founded and awarded the sum of €1,000.

1. Background to the Appeal Hearing

A Notice of Appeal was received by the Labour Court on 29 April 2024. An initial hearing of the appeal was held in Cork on 8 May 2025. Due to unforeseen resourcing issues in the Labour Court, no determination of the appeal issued, and the matter was reassigned for re-hearing by another Division of the Court. This is highly regrettable and the Court wishes to acknowledge the inconvenience posed to both parties.

A hearing date scheduled for 10 December 2025 was postponed due to the unavailability of the Managing Director of the Respondent on that date. A hearing on 11 February 2026 did not proceed, following an application made by the Complainant to seek a Correction Order to amend the name of the parties.  A Correction Order was lodged to the Court on 16 April 2026. A hearing of the appeal took place in Cork on 1 September 2026. The appeal is linked to EDA2655 which was heard by the Court on the same day.

   2. The Appeal Hearing 

At the outset of the hearing the Court clarified with both parties what submissions and documentation each side intended to rely upon during the hearing, given extensive correspondence on file from Mr O’Regan. Mr O’Regan confirmed that he had all relevant documentation with him and that he was happy to proceed with the appeal. The Court heard submissions from both sides and sworn testimony from the Complainant and Mr O’Regan. Both parties confirmed that they were satisfied that they were given an opportunity to make and present all relevant submission evidence to the Court.

   3. Application to Anonymise the Determination 

The Complainant’s representative made an application at the close of the hearing to anonymise the parties’ names in the Determination published on the Court’s website due to the nature of the appeal which addresses the Complainant’s pregnancy and subsequent miscarriage. Mr O’Regan did not oppose the application at the hearing. While the Court recognises the sensitive nature of the matters raised in the appeal, it found no basis for granting the application to anonymise the determination. The application is denied.

    4. Summary of Complainant’s Case:

The Complainant gave evidence that she did not receive a statement of terms and conditions upon commencing her employment with the Respondent, or at any time thereafter.

    5. Summary of the Respondent’s Case:

Mr O’Regan, on behalf of the Respondent company, submits that it complied with all statutory obligations under the Act as the Complainant had access to all terms and conditions of employment via a “To-do App”, which is a software programme, designed and built in house using Microsoft technology.

Mr O’Regan gave evidence that the company is a small operation which, since Covid-19, does not do paperwork. All employees on joining the company are required to self-administer the App by inputting their terms and conditions of employment.  The App is used by employees to clock in and out of work. When using the App, employees are required to scroll through their terms and conditions of employment each day before inputting their hours of work.

6. The Relevant law

The relevant provision of the Terms of Employment (Information) Act, 1994 in place at the relevant time were as follows: -

“(1) An employer shall, not later than 2 months after the commencement of an employee's employment with the employer, give or cause to be given to the employee a statement in writing containing the following particulars of the terms of the employee's employment, that is to say—

(a) the full names of the employer and the employee,

(b) the address of the employer in the State or, where appropriate, the address of the principal place of the relevant business of the employer in the State or the registered office (within the meaning of the Companies Act, 1963 ),

(c) the place of work or, where there is no fixed or main place of work, a statement specifying that the employee is required or permitted to work at various places,

(d) the title of the job or nature of the work for which the employee is employed,

(e) the date of commencement of the employee's contract of employment,

(f) in the case of a temporary contract of employment, the expected duration thereof or, if the contract of employment is for a fixed term, the date on which the contract expires,

(g) the rate or method of calculation of the employee's remuneration,

(h) the length of the intervals between the times at which remuneration is paid, whether a week, a month or any other interval,

(i) any terms or conditions relating to hours of work (including overtime),

(j) any terms or conditions relating to paid leave (other than paid sick leave),

(k) any terms or conditions relating to—

(i) incapacity for work due to sickness or injury and paid sick leave, and

(ii) pensions and pension schemes,

(l) the period of notice which the employee is required to give and entitled to receive (whether by or under statute or under the terms of the employee's contract of employment) to determine the employee's contract of employment or, where this cannot be indicated when the information is given, the method for determining such periods of notice,

(m) a reference to any collective agreements which directly affect the terms and conditions of the employee's employment including, where the employer is not a party to such agreements, particulars of the bodies or institutions by whom they were made.

(2) A statement shall be given to an employee under subsection (1) notwithstanding that the employee's employment ends before the end of the period within which the statement is required to be given.

(3) The particulars specified in paragraphs (g), (h), (i), (j), (k) and (l) of the said subsection (1), may be given to the employee in the form of a reference to provisions of statutes or instruments made under statute or of any other laws or of any administrative provisions or collective agreements, governing those particulars which the employee has reasonable opportunities of reading during the course of the employee's employment or which are reasonably accessible to the employee in some other way.

(4) A statement furnished by an employer under subsection (1) shall be signed and dated by or on behalf of the employer.

(5) A copy of the said statement shall be retained by the employer during the period of the employee's employment and for a period of 1 year thereafter.”

  7. Deliberations:

The Terms of Employment (Information) Act imposes obligations on an employer and confers a corresponding right on a worker to have the basic terms of employment set out in writing in accordance with section 3 of the Act. The obligation to give an employee a written statement of terms of employment rests solely with the Respondent. 

In this case, the Managing Director of the Respondent accepts that the Complainant was not given a written statement setting out her terms and conditions of employment but relies on documentation extracted from an in-house “To-do App” to demonstrate compliance with the Respondent’s statutory obligations under the Act. For her part, the Complainant accepted that she was required to use the App during her employment to record her working hours.

A document extracted from the “App”, which was opened to the Court and relied upon by the Respondent, did not contain particulars of the Complainant’s terms of employment as was required by the Act at the time the complaint was lodged to WRC on 30 August 2022. The document did not contain details of the Complainant’s name, the address of the Respondent, the place of work; the job title or nature of the work or the commencement date of the contract. No details were specified in relation to remuneration. No terms or conditions relating to hours of work (including overtime), paid leave, incapacity for work due to sickness or injury and paid sick leave, and pensions and pension schemes, notice provisions. The document was not signed and dated by or on behalf of the employer.

Having regard to the above the Court finds that the Respondent failed to give the Complainant, or caused to be given to her, a written statement of terms of employment as was required under the Act at the relevant time.

As a result, the Court finds that the Respondent has contravened the Act and the complaint is well founded.

Where a contravention of the Act occurs the Labour Court must make an award that is just and equitable having regard to all the circumstances but not exceeding 4 weeks’ remuneration in respect of the Complainant’s employment.

Having regard to the above, the Court considers that an award of €2,400. Which equates to 4 weeks’ remuneration, to be just and reasonable having regard to all the circumstances.

   8. Decision

The Court determines that the Respondent was in breach of the Act and the complaint is well founded.

The Court orders the Respondent to pay the sum of €2,400 as compensation to the Complainant being the amount which the Court considers just and equitable having regard to all the circumstances.

The decision of the Adjudication Officer is varied accordingly.

The Court so decides.

	Signed on behalf of the Labour Court
	Katie Connolly
AM	______________________
16/10/2026	Deputy Chairman

NOTE

Enquiries concerning this Decision should be addressed to Ms Áine Maunsell, Court Secretary.