Complainant

Respondent

Anonymised Parties

A Sales Executive

A Technology Company

Act

Complaint Reference No.

Date of Receipt

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

CA-00068526-001

09/01/2025

The respondent is a technology business engaged in the integration of video with sales data technology.  The complainant started working for them on April 3rd 2023 as a sales account executive.  A copy of his contract of employment which he included in his submission for the hearing shows that his annual salary was €75,000 plus commission of €55,000, based on the achievement of 100% of a quota of €1,100,000 in sales. 

In November 2023, the complainant received no wages, but this was rectified the following month when he received twice his normal net pay.

In January and February 2024, he received no wages, and in March 2024, he received less than half the wages that he should have been paid.  In April 2024, he received his normal pay; however, in May and June, he got no wages.  On July 15th 2024, the complainant gave his employer six weeks’ notice of his intention to leave on August 30th 2024.  A copy of a WhatsApp message dated August 24th 2024 shows that, around that time, the respondent was applying for funding from a lender and that money was available to pay the complainant two months’ wages before he finished up on August 30th 2024.

When he left the company, the complainant was owed wages for five months, amounting to net pay of €27,429, based on wages of €19,450 and commission of €7,979.

A schedule of emails and WhatsApp messages that the complainant submitted for the hearing shows that, between June and December 2024, various senior executives in the company, including the joint CEOs, the head of communications and the investor manager, confirmed to the complainant that he was owed the wages he claimed he was owed.  Shortly after the complainant left the business, on September 24th 2024, the investor manager wrote to the CEO and stated that he was aware that wages were owed to the complainant.  As late as 10 weeks after the complainant’s departure, he received an email from the joint CEO following a conversation the previous day with the investor manager in which the CEO confirmed that half of the amount owed “will be available by the end of the week with the rest available in December.”  At the hearing on June 6th 2025, the complainant showed me a WhatsApp message from the investor manager dated May 21st 2025, in which the manager stated that a drawdown of funds was about to be completed which would facilitate the payment to the complainant of the wages owed; however, no money was transferred to the complainant.

In his submission for the hearing, the complainant outlined the difficulties caused by the failure of the respondent to pay him his wages when they were due.  On top of this stress and inconvenience, he had to spend an inordinate amount of time writing to various managers in the company, but he has been consistently deceived by false promises.  He also presented himself at a hearing at the WRC in April this year, and he agreed to an adjournment when his former employer indicated that they would shortly be in funds and would be able to pay him. 

In the absence of any resolution of this matter between him and the respondent, the complainant has had to resort to the services of the WRC.  He claims that that the failure to pay him his wages when his employment terminated in August 2024 is an illegal deduction, contrary to s.5(6) of the Payment of Wages Act 1991.

Section 5(6) of the Payment of Wages Act 1991 provides that, to ground a complaint under the Act, wages must be properly payable:

(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 made 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.

It is extremely regrettable that the complainant had to spend so much time and energy trying to exert his basic entitlement to be paid his wages, an issue about which there is no dispute. 

From the evidence of the complainant, it is apparent that the wages he claims are properly payable.  It is apparent also from the correspondence he submitted that the respondent agrees that his wages are due to him.  I am satisfied therefore, that, by failing to pay the complainant €27,429 net which was properly payable on August 30th 2024, the respondent has made an illegal deduction from his wages.

I decide that this complaint is well founded.  In accordance with section 6 of the Payment of Wages Act 1991 (as amended), I direct the respondent to pay the complainant compensation of €27,429, comprising his net wages not paid up to August 30th 2024.

Wages properly payable