Complainant

Respondent

Parties

Davide  Carbone

A Provider

Representatives

  Self- represented

 IBEC

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-00067995-001

10/12/2024

Request to anonymize the client company.

At the outset of the hearing, the respondent, a managed service provider, made an application that the client company to which the respondent assigned the complainant should be anonymized due to commercial sensitivity and on the basis that there was no relationship between the client and the complainant.  The respondent asked to make legal submissions on this point, and they were received on 16/6/25. The complainant agreed to the anonymisation request.

 The respondent’s legal submissions referred to previous decisions, specifically to Tomislav Orecic v Occipital Ltd, ADJ-00050922 and Anatasia Putzier v Premier Recruitment International U.C ADJ -000- 49902, which accepted the anonymisation of the client company. In Tomislav Orecic the adjudicator accepted the argument that the client of the respondent not being party to the complaint, and not, therefore having an opportunity to refute any assertions or allegations made against them throughout the hearing contravened the principles of natural justice.

The situation is the same in the instant case, the client is not party to the proceedings, and is not in a position to refute any assertions made about them. I accept the respondent’s request and will refer to the client as Client A in this decision.

The complainant has submitted a complaint of an unlawful deduction of €600 from his wages in contravention of the Act of 1991 over that period of his employment which ran from 1/1/2025 –until his resignation on 18/3/2025, and in addition, a deduction of a travel allowance which amounted to €3120 annually.

He worked as an AI language generator.                                          

His hourly rate was €16.41. He worked 37.5 hours a week.

The complainant submitted his complaint to the WRC on 10/12/2024.

The complainant submits that the respondent has contravened the provisions of the 1991 Act.

The complaint’s complaint form to the WRC, dated 10/12/2024, identified a deduction of €1200.

In later correspondence with the WRC, he identified the date of the deduction as  24 October 2024.

At the resumed hearing on 24 /6 /2025, he identified the deduction as €600.

The respondent recruited him in July 2024 for a position with Client A

The respondent sent him an email on 29/7/2024, detailing all the allowances and benefits that had been agreed within the respondent’s office. He accepted the offer of 29/7/2024 and moved to Ireland to start working with Client A on the 19/8/2024. H signed a contract with the respondent on 19/8/2024.

During the early days of September, he contacted HR to make sure that everything was in order with his offer of 29/7/2024, specifically the travel allowance €3.120 Euro per year and a KPI bonus of €2.970 Euro per year as he had not received these in his August salary.

On the 28/10/2024 the respondent asked him to sign a revised contract, backdated to the 19/8/24, the same date as his existing contract with clause 5.7 deleted , the clause which provided for his bonus.

He refused to sign that contract.

The HR Department who failed to oversee the offer of bonus and a travel allowance, prior to him accepting the offer of 29/7/2024 and moving to Ireland, believed that the offer of a bonus and the offer of a travel allowance were mistakes which  warranted no more than an apology for the loss of circa €350 net per month, but no compensation.

Evidence of the complainant given under affirmation.

The complainant acknowledged the respondent’s payment to him of the bonus for the period 19/8/2024-31/12/2024. In reply to a question from the adjudicator at the hearing in June, the complainant confirmed that the unlawful deduction now stood at €600 in respect of the period 1/1/2025-18/3/2025.

He does not accept the employer’s stance that he is ineligible for payment of the bonus for Q1, 1/1/2025- 31/3/2015, due to his resignation on 18/3/2025, leaving him 13 days short of the requirement to complete a quarter before eligibility can arise. This qualification on the payment of bonus does not appear in his contract or in the employee handbook.

The complainant stated that if the respondent were to pay him the remainder of the bonus (€600), he would forgo the claim for the travel allowance which amounts to €3120 per annum on a pro rata basis.

The apology received from the respondent is an inadequate response for their failure to honour the terms offered to him on 29/7/2024.

The respondent denies that they contravened the provisions of the Act of 1991.

Payment of the Bonus.

The respondent advised that they had conceded payment of the bonus from 18/8/2024 up until 31/12/2024.

The cognisable period was 11/6/2024-10/12/2024.

Their payment of the bonus to the complainant went beyond the cognisable period and beyond what was required of them. The complainant submitted his complaint to the WRC on 10/12/2024.Their obligation -if such existed -ended on that date, yet they paid him the bonus in respect of the period 10/12/24-31/12/2024.This is apart from the requirement to complete KPIs for Q1 of 2025 before eligibility could arise. Resigning on 18/3/2035 rendered him ineligible for payment of the bonus for Q1.

The complainant’s claim for the bonus in respect of the period 1/11/26-18/3/2-25, the date on which he left the company, is therefore not properly payable, and as such cannot be held to be an unlawful deduction contrary to the provisions of the Act of 1991.

 The respondent advised the complainant on 12 September 2024, that he was ineligible for the travel allowance as it was only payable to those employees who worked the evening shift.

Evidence of HR Business partner given under affirmation.

Travel Allowance.

The witness confirmed that the complainant had no entitlement to a travel allowance. It was only payable to employees who worked the night shift. It had never been paid to any employee who worked the day shift. The complainant worked 9-5.30.

The respondent states that the complainant’s complaint should be dismissed.

I am obliged to establish if the respondent made an unlawful deduction in contravention of the Act of 1991 when the respondent withheld payment of a bonus and a travel allowance from the complainant.

Relevant Law.

 Section 5 (1) of the 1991 Act states

“An employer shall not make a deduction from the wages of an employee (or receive any payment from an employee) unless—

(a) the deduction (or payment) is required or authorised to be made by virtue of any statute or any instrument made under statute,

(b) the deduction (or payment) is required or authorised to be made by virtue of a term of the employee's contract of employment included in the contract before, and in force at the time of, the deduction or payment, or

(c) in the case of a deduction, the employee has given his prior consent in writing to it.”

Section 5 (6) of the Payment of Wages Act, 1991 identifies a deduction as follows:

“Where the total amount of 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.” 

The cognisable period is 13/6/2024- 10/12/2024

As a first step in establishing the existence or not of an unlawful deduction, the complainant must demonstrate that the payment deducted from him was a properly payable sum.

Non-Payment of Bonus.

The amount claimed.

I find that the complainant was offered a package which included a bonus of 10% on his annual salary of €32,000 without any qualification on 29/7/2024.

The complaint form identified a deduction of €1200 in respect of the non – payment of his bonus from the 24 /10/24- 18/3/2025, a period of 20 weeks from the date of the deduction.

While the respondent initially withheld payment of the bonus which was the principal focus of the complainant, it is accepted that the respondent notified the complainant on the 14/4/25 that they  would pay his bonus of €1,107, a pro rata sum payable in respect of the period 19 August 2024 up until the 31 December 2024 ,a date 20 days beyond the lodgement of the complaint .

As a result of the respondent having made the payment of €1107 on 2/5/2025, the complainant was asked by the adjudicator to identify the actual deduction. The complainant was unrepresented. He revised the deduction downwards to €600 at the reconvened hearing on the 24/6/2025. This deduction of €600 was in in respect of the 10-week period from 1/1/2025- 18/3/2025, a period which fell after the submission of his complaint on 10/12/2024.

As stated, the cognisable period is the 13/6/2024- 10/12/2024 and the complainant is debarred from making a complaint of an unlawful deduction of €600 for the period 1/1/2025-- 18/3/2025, a period beyond the date of the lodgement of the complaint. This sum is not a properly payable sum.

I do not find this sum of €600 to be an unlawful deduction from the complainant’s wages.

I do not find this element of his complaint to be well founded.

The deduction of the complainant’s travel allowance of €3120 per annum.

The complainant in the narrative on his complaint form included the deduction of his travel allowance as a contravention of the Act of 1991.

The respondent’s email of 29/7/24 to the complainant details a list of what they call the “formal job offer”, and includes the travel allowance of €3,120 per annum. It was an unequivocal assurance of a travel allowance, the only qualification being that it was payable to employees working on site which the complainant was.

The complainant gave evidence that he accepted the job based on this offer of 29/7/2024, moved to Ireland and signed a contract on the 19/8/2024.  

His contract signed on 19/8/2024 gave discretion to management on the payment of allowances and did not undercut in any way the earlier, above offer of 29 /7/2024.

On 12 /9/24 the respondent emailed the complainant to advise that the travel allowance was only payable to those employees working the evening shift, a fact not disclosed to the complainant prior to him accepting the offer, moving to Ireland, signing a contract and commencing employment with the respondent.

I find the combination of these circumstances renders the travel allowance to be properly payable for the cognisable period which is the 19/8/2024- 10/12/2024, a period of 16 weeks. I find the sum of €960  to be properly payable to the complainant.

I find this element of the complainant’s complaint to be well founded.

I find that the respondent unlawfully deducted the sum of €960 from the complainant in contravention of section 5 of the Act of 1991.

I find that the respondent must pay the sum of €960 to the complainant subject to all lawful deductions.

I decide that this complaint is well founded, and I direct the respondent to pay the sum of €960 to the complainant subject to all lawful deductions.

Unlawful deduction.