PWD269

PW/24/142

PARTIES:

DIVISION:

SUBJECT:

Appeal of Adjudication Officer Decision No's: ADJ-00044246 (CA-00055009-001)

BACKGROUND:

This is an appeal of an Adjudication Officer’s Decision made pursuant to the Payment of Wages Act, 1991.  The appeal was heard by the Labour Court in accordance with Section 44 of the Workplace Relations Act, 2015.  The following is the Court's Decision.

DECISION:

1  Background to the Appeal

 This is an appeal by Mr Rooney of Adjudication Officer’s Decision ADJ-00044246 CA-00055009-001 given under the Payment of Wages Act, 1991 (the Act) . The Adjudication Officer held that his complaint was not well founded. In this decision the parties will be referred to in the manner they were referred to at first instance. Mr Rooney as the Complainant and Twitter International Unlimited as the Respondent. In the course of the hearing the Court was advised that the company name had changed to X Internet Unlimited, and it was agreed that the decision would issue under that name.

The complaint was lodged with the WRC on 12 February 2023. The cognisable period for the purpose of the Act is 13 August 2022 to 12 February 2023. It was appealed to the Labour Court on 9 September 2024. A case management conference was held on 7 March 2025, and hearings took place on 29 and 30 July 2025 and 27 January 2026.

 The Complainant worked with the Respondent from 23 September 2013 until his employment ended on or about 18 December 2022.  The Complainant submits he was not paid a bonus for 2022 that was properly payable. The Respondent disputes that he was entitled to a bonus for 2022. There is a linked case UD/24/120.         

2 Summary of Complainants submission

 Mr Lyons SC submitted on behalf of the Complainant that he was at all times an exemplary employee of the Respondent with long and distinguished service in excess of nine years. In October 2022 after the acquisition of the company by Mr Elon Musk there was a very sudden change in the established norms in the company. This manifested itself in the dismantling of employee entitlements and in particular in the ‘fork in the road’ email which required signing up to within 46 hours.  Despite the tight timescale set for signing up, the terms that were being signed up to were completely unclear. The extra ordinary nature of this email can be seen from the fact that the Respondent had to clarify in FAQ’s that this was a genuine demand and not a fishing exercise. The Complainant was dismissed for declining to click yes on the relevant box and without further notice access to all his working systems was terminated.

 Mr Lyons submitted that the payment of wages case is slightly atypical because in the ordinary run of events a bonus would have been payable in the March payroll of any given year. In this case a decision was taken some time at the end of 2022 not to fund the bonus pool. It is accepted that the complaint was lodged on 12 February 2023 and that the if the bonus was payable if would fall to be paid in March 2023. However. the Complainant’s position is that the wrong had been done when the employer made the decision not to make a bonus payment for 2022. It is accepted that that a full bonus pool would not have been warranted but the Complainant cannot accept that the abolition of the bonus pool was warranted either. Their position is that 15% of the Complainant’s base salary was payable as a bonus and the decision to not pay same was a breach of the Act.

3 Summary of Respondent’s submission in respect of the substantive issue

 Ms Smith SC submitted that for there to be a sustainable claim the bonus must have been payable within the cognisable period. The Complainant must establish that something was properly payable during that period. Ms Smith submitted that the Global Discretionary Bonus Plan had to be funded in order for a bonus to be paid. The evidence the Court heard in the linked case was that performance metrics were set that had to be met and in 2022 they were not met. The decision to pay or not pay a bonus was discretionary and was at the discretion of the Compensation Committee. This is clearly set out in the plan. If a bonus was due, it would not have fallen to be paid until March 2023 which is outside of the cognisable period. There was no obligation to fund the bonus pool which was run by the parent company, and they chose not to fund it for 2022. In circumstances where nothing was properly payable during the cognisable period there cannot be a breach of the Act.

4 The applicable law

Section 1 of the Act states:

“wages”, in relation to an employee, means any sums payable to the employee by the employer in connection with his employment, including—

( a) any fee, bonus or commission, or any holiday, sick or maternity pay, or any other emolument, referable to his employment, whether payable under his contract of employment or otherwise, and

( b) any sum payable to the employee upon the termination by the employer of his contract of employment without his having given to the employee the appropriate prior notice of the termination, being a sum paid in lieu of the giving of such notice:

Provided however that the following payments shall not be regarded as wages for the purposes of this definition:

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

(ii) any payment by way of a pension, allowance or gratuity in connection with the death, or the retirement or resignation from his employment, of the employee or as compensation for loss of office,

(iii) any payment referable to the employee's redundancy,

(iv) any payment to the employee otherwise than in his capacity as an employee,

(v) any payment in kind or benefit in kind

Section 5 of the Payment of Wage Act 1991 deals with regulation of certain deductions made and payments received by employers and in particular section 5(6) states;

“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,

5 Discussion

In cases of this nature the first thing the Court has to establish as set out in Marek Balans v Tesco Ireland Limited [2020] IEHC 55 is that there were wages that were properly payable during the relevant period.  The Act defines wages as “in relation to an employee, means any sums payable to the employee by the employer in connection with his employment”.

 The undisputed evidence before the Court was that the no bonus was paid to any staff in 2022. The bonus scheme was discretionary, and a decision was taken not to fund the bonus pool for 2022. It was not disputed that had the bonus pool been funded, the arising bonus would not have fallen due until March 2023, which is outside the cognisable period.

6 Decision

The Court having considered the submissions and evidence of the parties determines that the Complainant has not identified wages that were properly payable during the relevant period and that were not paid. On that basis his claim must fail.

 The Appeal fails. The decision of the Adjudication Officer is upheld.

The Court so decides.

	Signed on behalf of the Labour Court
	Louise O'Donnell
AR	______________________
15th April 2026	Chairman

NOTE

Enquiries concerning this Decision should be addressed to Mr Aidan Ralph, Court Secretary.