Complainant

Respondent

Parties

Pearse  Kearney

Metlab Ltd

Act

Complaint Reference No.

Date of Receipt

Complaint seeking adjudication by the Workplace Relations Commission under section 27 of the Organisation of Working Time Act, 1997

CA-00074052-001

04/08/2025

The complainant gave evidence on affirmation.

In his original complaint he said that the respondent reduced his overtime rate from time and half to standard time, and insisted on him doing overnights against his wishes. This led him to look for a new job.

He gave his employer one week’s notice, but the respondent insisted on a month’s notice as provided for in the contract. He says that he has a slight problem reading and understanding such documents.

They had put him on two training courses, but he says that this was unrelated to his role and only benefited the company.  One course cost €1000 and the other €800.  

When he left the respondent’s employment he was owed seven days leave. However, this was not paid and was offset against the costs of the training course and which they deducted from his final pay.

However, in his evidence he said that he only had an issue with repaying one of these course fees.

The respondent drew attention to the complainant’s contract of employment in respect of staff development.

At paragraph 3.f of the document there is provision for the repayment of course fees as follows.

3.4. STAFF DEVELOPMENT PROGRAMME

. Where the costs of any such training are borne by the company the following conditions of reimbursement by the employee shall apply.

a) Employee terminates employment within twelve months of completion of training & certification 75% of all training fees shall be repaid.

b) Employee terminates employment between 12 and 24 months of completion of training 50% of all training & certification fees shall be repaid.

c) Employee terminates employment between 24 and 36 months 25% of training and certification fees shall be repaid.

N.B. Safety training is expressly excluded from the above clause

The respondent accepts that the complainant was due seven days’ pay in lieu of annual leave (to the value of €1,200.00) and set out its position in an email on July 23rd, 2025, in which it raised the complainant’s refusal to work out his full four weeks’ notice.

It referred to the provision above in the company handbook and stated that the course fees would be offset against his annual leave payments. That email also noted the complainant’s objections to the company’s actions

The facts of this case are clear and undisputed.

The complainant decided to quit his employment after just under fifteen months.

In the course of that employment, he was asked to undertake a number of training courses and while he disputes the value of at least one of them that is not relevant to the complaint.

On his departure and acting on the provisions of the contract of employment set out above the respondent sought reimbursement of the course fees.

The complainant objected on the basis that he had not really read the relevant provision in the contract. It would not be uncommon for this to be the case but once the contract of employment is accepted and applied not having read it will not provide a defence to the application of its terms.

Nor does the fact that the course might not have had much value, as perceived by the worker, have any relevance to the complaint.

Section 19(1) of the organisation of Working Time Act sets out the entitlement to annual leave.

Entitlement to annual leave.

19.—(1) Subject to the First Schedule (which contains transitional provisions in respect of the leave years 1996 to 1998), an employee shall be entitled to paid annual leave (in this Act referred to as “annual leave”) equal to—

(a) 4 working weeks in a leave year in which he or she works at least 1,365 hours (unless it is a leave year in which he or she changes employment),

(b) one-third of a working week for each month in the leave year in which he or she works at least 117 hours, or

(c) 8 per cent. of the hours he or she works in a leave year (but subject to a maximum of 4 working weeks):

In passing it is worth noting that most elementary principle of statutory interpretation (and underlined above for ease of reference), which is that the words ‘shall be entitled to’ mean what they say, whether in the terms of everyday speech or of statutory construction.

There is nothing discretionary or conditional about this entitlement.

Section 23 deals with the position on termination of employment.

Compensation on cesser of employment.

23.—F25[(1) (a) Where—

(i) an employee ceases to be employed, and

(ii) the whole or any portion of the annual leave in respect of the relevant period remains to be granted to the employee,

the employee shall, as compensation for the loss of that annual leave, be paid by his or her employer an amount equal to the pay, calculated at the normal weekly rate or, as the case may be, at a rate proportionate to the normal weekly rate, that he or she would have received had he or she been granted that annual leave.

Again, the entitlement to this payment in the statute is clear and unambiguous; it is that the employee shall be paid an amount equivalent to the value of the annual leave which is outstanding.

I am not required to reach any conclusion on whether the reimbursement of the course fees is due to the respondent although the provisions of the Company Handbook are clear enough.

The issue is the manner in which the  respondent set about recovering what it says was owed.

The only question to be determined here is whether the respondent breached the terms of the Act,  (as set out above) by not paying the complainant his statutory entitlement.

I find that it did.

There is no contractual or statutory provision to enable an offsetting arrangement such as that implemented by the respondent and the respondent confirmed this in the course of the hearing.

If the respondent wishes to pursue the complainant for any alleged civil debt, or breach of contract it has the same right as any other aggrieved citizen to do so. What it may not do is trade the statutory rights of one of its employees against any such debts in flagrant breach of the statute.

The complaint is well founded.

For the reasons set out above complaint CA -74052-001 is well founded and I award the complainant €1200.00 in lieu of annual leave

Payment of Wages