Complainant

Respondent

Parties

Jennifer Keogh

Danu Homecare Ltd

Representatives

 Hamilton Turner Solicitors

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-00068055-001

11/12/2024

This matter was scheduled to be heard at 12 o’clock on Wednesday 2nd April 2025. At the time the hearing was due to begin, there was no appearance by or on behalf of the Respondent. The Adjudication Officer checked the address that the hearing notification letter was sent to and the Complainant gave sworn evidence that this was the address where the administrative office is located and where she attended for business related activity.

The Complainant worked for the Respondent as a home care assistant and submitted this complaint under the Payment of Wages Act, 1991 on 11th December 2024. The Complainant gave evidence under oath at the hearing and also provided a booklet of supporting documentation.

The Complainant’s representative made an opening submission in relation to this matter and a number of related cases. He stated that there are seven Complainants bringing complaints under the Payment of Wages Act, 1991. Each of the Complainants are or were employees of the Respondent. Each Complainant had been an employee of Ann’s Homecare Ireland Ltd until October 2023 when, under European Communities (Protection of Employees on Transfer of Undertakings) Regulations 2003, their employment transferred to the Respondent. The Complainants were employed to work seven 12 hour shifts, which equated to eighty four hours per fortnight. In November 2023, one month after the transfer of the Complainant’s employment to the Respondent, a letter was sent to each Complainant to say that their working time would change.

As homecare assistants, the Complainants made several home visits per day and used their own vehicle to travel between each property. The change that occurred is related to the time spent between each home visit. The Complainants had been receiving a flat rate for eighty four hours per fortnight, but this changed to no longer being paid for travel time between home visits. The Complainants were promised a minimum of sixty hours per fortnight. It was submitted that they still worked seven 12 hour shifts, but were no longer being paid for time between calls. They did not agree to this change and sought support through their union. A grievance was raised internally and a conciliation process entered into, but without any satisfactory resolution.

The Complainant’s representative applied to extend the cognisable period on behalf of each Complainant. It was requested that the Complainant could recover loss for the period from when the change was implemented in November 2023 until the complaint form was lodged in December 2024. The basis of this application was that they had engaged in good faith in the conciliation process and should not be penalised for the fact that there was no satisfactory resolution.

The Complainant is seeking payment of the difference between the original 84 hours per fortnight and the reduced 60 hours per fortnight which the Complainant now receives.

Complainant’s evidence

The Complainant said that she started work with Anns Homecare Ireland Limited on 26th March 2022 and finished her employment on 14th February 2025. She was employed as a homecare assistant and had a 12 hour working day. Her shifts were spread over two weeks. She was paid a flat 12 hour rate for 6 days and a higher premium for Sundays.

The Complainant said that she travelled a lot as part of her work and it could be very stressful. In October 2023 her employment transferred to the Respondent and in November 2023 her hours were changed. It went from being paid a flat rate to being paid just for the calls and not for the travel time in between. If calls were cancelled she was no longer paid for this time. She did not agree with this change and spoke to her supervisor about it but nothing was done. She raised a formal grievance in February 2024 but never heard anything back about this. A copy of the grievance letter was provided. It is dated 16th February 2024 and states:

“I wish to raise a formal grievance in accordance with the Ann’s Homecare grievance procedure. The grievance relates to the unilateral changes made to my terms and conditions of employment.

Under employment law in Ireland an employer cannot unilaterally amend an employment contract, fundamentally altering terms and conditions; without prior negotiation, consultation and agreement.

I was not consulted about the changes to my terms and conditions, I was presented with a new employment contract as a fait accompli. Despite the fact that I have not signed this new contract and indeed reject the changes within the new contract, you have proceeded to amend my terms and conditions without my express agreement.

In this respect I believe you are in violation of The Terms of Employment (Information) Act 1994.

Please note that following hearing of this grievance and any subsequent appeals, I reserve my right to refer this matter to an adjudication process in the Workplace Relations Commission. I also wish to be represented in this matter by my union representative.”

The Complainant said that the change resulted in a significant reduction in her wages. She had been receiving €16.50 per hour and said that she was at a loss of €432.53 per fortnight, which was a total of €11,245.78 up to the date of her complaint form. She provided a payslip dated 21st November 2024 showing 54 hours worked and a net pay of €966.54.

The Complainant gave evidence that the address provided for the Respondent was the usual place of business and where she attended for work related activities.

The Respondent did not attend the hearing and no submissions or written communication of any kind was received from the Respondent in advance of the hearing date.

At the time the hearing was due to commence, I enquired of the Complainant if the address provided was for an active administrative office and she confirmed that it was. I confirmed that the hearing notification letter was issued by post to the Respondent’s usual place of business on 11th February 2025.

Following the hearing, I was notified by a case officer that a phone call had been received from the Respondent who wished for a representative to come on record, however no application was received at that time requesting any postponement or re-listing of this and/or related cases. A representative subsequently did come on record. On 28th August 2025, the Respondent’s representative asked for the cases to be relisted due to an error in communication. The Complainant did not consent to the matter being relisted and, in the circumstances, given the reasons advanced and the passage of time, the Adjudication Officer did not agree to re-list this case. However, considering this correspondence, it is evident that the Respondent was on notice of the hearing date and arrangements but did not attend.

Application for an extension of Time

The Complainant lodged this complaint on the 11th December 2024. The Complainant’s representative made an application to extend the time for bringing the complaint in relation to the deduction of wages which occurred outside the six month period preceding the lodging of the complaint.

Following the judgement of Hogan J in Health Service Executive v. John McDermott [2014] IEHC 331 where he held that the Labour Court was correct in deciding that each and every alleged deduction under the Payment of Wages Act, 1991 was a new contravention, I am satisfied that I can examine any alleged contravention of that Act that occurred within the cognisable period. The cognisable period is the six month period preceding the receipt of a complaint form by the Director General of the Workplace Relations Commission. In this case, the complaint form was submitted on 11th December 2024 and so I can consider any alleged contravention that occurred from 12th June 2024 up to the 11th December 2024.

The Complainant’s application is that I also inquire into any alleged deductions that were made between 30th November 2023 and 11th June 2024. In other words, it is an application to extend the time frame for consideration of the complaint.

Section 41(6) of the Workplace Relations Act, 2015 states:

Subject to subsection (8), an adjudication officer shall not entertain a complaint referred to him or her under this section if it has been presented to the Director General after the expiration of the period of 6 months beginning on the date of the contravention to which the complaint relates.

The Complainant is effectively making an application to apply section 41(8) of that Act. That section states:

An adjudication officer may entertain a complaint or dispute to which this section applies presented or referred to the Director General after the expiration of the period referred to in subsection (6) or (7) (but not later than 6 months after such expiration), as the case may be, if he or she is satisfied that the failure to present the complaint or refer the dispute within that period was due to reasonable cause.

The application for extending time is made on the basis that the Complainant engaged in good faith in a conciliation procedure and awaited its outcome prior to presenting this complaint within the usual six month time frame. She requests an extension of time in relation to the deduction of wages which occurred outside the six month period preceding the lodging of this complaint.

As noted above, section 41(8) of the Workplace Relations Act, 2015, allows an extension of time if reasonable cause for the delay in lodging the claim is shown. The timeframe may be extended by up to a further six months.

For an extension of time to be granted, the Complainant must provide an explanation for the delay and offer a justifiable excuse for the delay. The Complainant must establish a causal connection between the reason for the delay and the failure to present the complaint in time. Finally, it must be shown that the complaint would have been presented in time if not for the factors relied upon as reasonable cause. It is the actual delay that must be explained and justified.

The explanation and justification for the delay in this case is that the Complainant had engaged in a conciliation process and awaited the outcome of that prior to submitting the complaint. The Labour Court has considered this issue on multiple occasions, albeit in a different type of case.

In Health Service Executive - And -Ms Rebecca Forde EDA2234, the Respondent made a submission to the effect that the Court has made it clear repeatedly that utilising a grievance procedure does not provide reasonable cause for the submission of a late claim. It highlighted two relevant cases namely:

Business Mobile Security Ltd. t/a Seneca Limited v. John McEvoy EDA 1621, in which the Court dealt with this matter at length. [and in]

Brothers of Charity Services Galway v Kieran O’ Toole EDA 177, the Court determined that utilising internal procedures could not be accepted as preventing the initiation of a complaint within the statutory limits.

It was stated that “The Court has repeatedly referred with approval to the cases quoted.”

The Court stated the below in its determination of the issue:

As the Respondent noted, the Court has dealt extensively in the ‘McEvoy’ and the ‘Brothers of Charity’ cases, see case references above, with the argument that a worker was delayed in lodging a complaint due to the fact of them pursuing internal processes. It is not necessary to reiterate at length here the Court’s view other than noting that, ordinarily, of itself and unless there are circumstances that could warrant an exception, the utilisation of an internal process does not justify delay in bringing proceedings.

The above case was related to complaints under the Employment Equality Acts 1998 – 2015, rather than the Payment of Wages Act, 1991 , and addresses an internal grievance process rather than a conciliation process. However, the principle applied is sound and, in my view, is equally applicable to a conciliation process as to an internal process. Following the reasoning of the Labour Court that the utilisation of a grievance procedure does not provide reasonable cause, I am not satisfied that reasonable cause exists in this case to consider any alleged deduction that occurred prior to the cognisable period, namely before 12th June 2024, which is 6 months prior to the lodgement of this complaint on the 11th December 2024.

I will therefore consider whether there has been an unlawful deduction from the Complainant’s wages between 12th June 2024 and 11th December 2024.

Complaint under the Payment of Wages Act, 1991

The Complainant’s complaint is made under the Payment of Wages Act, 1991. Section 5 of that Act provides as follows:

“5. (1) 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.”

And

“5(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.”

Section 5(6) of the Payment of Wages Act, 1991 was considered in Balans v. Tesco Ireland Limited [2020] IEHC 55. In that case, MacGrath J. re-affirmed the proposition that the first matter to be determined is what wages are properly payable under the contract of employment. If it is established that a deduction within the meaning of the Payment of Wages Act, 1991 has been made from the wages properly payable, it is then necessary to consider whether that deduction was lawful. MacGrath J. stated at paragraphs 34 and 35 of the judgement:

“Section 5 of the Act of 1991 prohibits the making of deductions from wages save in certain circumstances. Section 5(6) provides that where 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, then, except insofar as the deficiency or non – payment is attributable to an error of computation, the amount of the deficiency or non – payment should be treated as a deduction made by the employer from the wages of the employee on the occasion.

Central to the court’s analysis must be the concepts of wages properly payable and the circumstances in which, if there is a deficiency in respect of those such payments, it arose as a result of an error of computation.”

MacGrath J. went on to consider the case of Dunnes Stores (Cornelscourt) Limited v. Lacey [2007] 1 IR 478 which contemplated the question of remuneration properly payable to an employee before considering the question of a deduction or whether a deduction was unlawful. Referring to that case he stated:

“This decision supports the proposition that the first matter which should be addressed by the Labour Court is to determine what wages are properly payable under the contract.”

In the first instance therefore, I must be satisfied what wages are properly payable to the Complainant in the cognisable period. 

The Complainant says that the properly payable wages are comprised of 84 hours per fortnight. She described in her grievance letter dated 16th February 2024 that there had been “unilateral changes to my terms and conditions of employment.” However, she did not provide any supporting documentation to show what her terms and conditions are, or were, at the relevant time. For example, she did not include a copy of her contract of employment.

In a complaint of this nature, the burden of proof is on a Complainant to establish what wages are properly payable to them and then, further, to particularise and quantify that claim. The Complainant has not done either in this case.

While I accept her oral evidence that her working pattern was 84 hours per fortnight and that she was previously paid at this rate, I am not satisfied that she had a contractual entitlement to this amount and that it was, therefore, properly payable.  In the absence of any supporting documentary proofs, I do not find that the Complainant has established that wages for 84 hours per fortnight were properly payable.

I am not satisfied, based on the information that has been provided to me, that the Complainant has established what wages were properly payable to her during the cognisable period. In those circumstances, I do not find in favour of the Complainant.

For the reasons set out above, I do not find that this complaint is well founded

Payment of Wages – properly payable