RPD262

PARTIES:

DIVISION:

SUBJECT:

The Worker appealed the Decision of the Adjudication Officer to the Labour Court on 12 January 2025 in accordance with the Redundancy Payments Acts 1967 to 2014. A Labour Court hearing took place on 14 April 2026.

The following is the Decision of the Court.

BACKGROUND:

The Worker appealed the Decision of the Adjudication Officer to the Labour Court on 12 January 2025 in accordance with the Redundancy Payments Acts 1967 to 2014. A Labour Court hearing took place on 14 April 2026.

The following is the Decision of the Court.

DECISION:

1. Background to the Appeal

This is an appeal by Sinead Plunkett of a decision of an Adjudication Officer made under the Redundancy Payments Act, 1967 (“the 1967 Act”). The Adjudication Officer held that the complaint was lodged to the Workplace Commission outside the statutory time limits and that he did not have jurisdiction not hear the compliant.

For ease, the parties are referred to in this Decision as they were at first instance. Hence, Sinead Plunkett is referred to as “the Complainant” and Little Bunnies Montessori Ltd as “the Respondent”.

A hearing of the Labour Court was held in Dublin on 14 April 2026. The Court heard submissions and witness testimony from both parties. The Court heard a linked appeal of a decision made under the Unfair Dismissals Act 1977 on the same day.  The Complainant withdrew six appeals of decisions made under other employment rights statutes at the hearing.

The Respondent is a Montessori School, which was established by the Complainant in 2016.  Ownership of the business transferred from the Complainant, via an asset purchase agreement, to the Respondent on 30 June 2022. The parties agreed that the Complainant would remain on as an employee of the Respondent on a one-year fixed term contract.

1. Preliminary Matter

The Court’s jurisdiction to hear the complaint on appeal having regard to the statutory time limits are set down at Section 24 of the Redundancy Payments Acts are as follows:

24.—Notwithstanding any other provision of this Act, an employee shall not be entitled to a lump sum unless before the end of the period of 52 weeksbeginning on the date of dismissal or the date of termination of employment—

(a) the payment has been agreed and paid, or

(b) the employee has made a claim for the payment by notice in writing given to the employer, or

(c) a question as to the right of the employee to the payment, or as to the amount of the payment, has been referred to the Director General under section 39.

(2) Notwithstanding any provision of this Act, an employee shall not be entitled to a weekly payment unless he has become entitled to a lump sum.

(2A) Where an employee who fails to make a claim for a lump sum within the period of 52 weeks mentioned in subsection (1) (as amended) makes such a claim before the end of the period of 104 weeks beginning on the date of dismissal or the date of termination of employment, the adjudication officer, if he is satisfiedthat the employee would have been entitled to the lump sum and that the failure was due to a reasonable cause, may declare the employee to be entitled to the lump sum and the employee shall thereupon become so entitled.

(3) Notwithstanding subsection (2A), where an employee establishes to the satisfaction of the Director General—

(a) that failure to make a claim for a lump sum before the end of the period of 104 weeks mentioned in that subsection was caused by his ignorance of the identity of his employer or employers or by his ignorance of a change of employer involving his dismissal and engagement under a contract with another employer, and

(b) that such ignorance arose out of or was contributed to by a breach of a statutory duty to give the employee either notice of his proposed dismissal or a redundancy certificate,

the period of 104 weeks shall commence from such date as the Director Generalat his discretionconsiders reasonable having regard to all the circumstances.

In linked decision under the Unfair Dismissals Act 1977 [insert UD number] the Court decided that the Complainant’s employment with the Respondent ended on the 13 December 2022. Accordingly, the complaint under the 1967 Act was lodged to the WRC outside the initial 12-month statutory timeframe for lodging a complaint about a contravention of that Act.

Rule 34 of the Labour Court Rules provides that: -

“The Court may, in its discretion, give a preliminary ruling on any aspect of the case where it is satisfied that time and expense may be saved by the giving of such a ruling and/or where it has the potential to be determinative of the case”.

By agreement with the parties, the Court proposed that it would hear and decide the preliminary matter in the first instance. It advised the parties if it decided that the complaint was lodged to the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) within time, a further hearing would be scheduled to consider the substantive appeal. If the Court decided that the complaint was lodged outside the time limits set down in the Act, the appeal would be out of time and statute barred.

The Court heard submissions and witness testimony from both parties on the preliminary matter.

1. Summary position of the Complainant

The Complainant lodged a complaint under the 1967 Act to the WRC on 29 December 2023.

The Complainant was unable to submit the complaint before that time for several reasons; she was suffering from ill health; the Respondent delayed sending her information relevant to her appeal; she was under duress; the Respondent subjected her to threatening behaviour.

1. Summary position of the Respondent

The Complainant resigned from her employment on 13 December 2022.  On 29 December 2023, more than one year after she resigned, the Complainant lodged her complaint to the WRC.

The Complainant has failed to provide any evidentiary basis to demonstrate that she was not in a position to lodge her complaint any sooner. No cogent basis had been tendered by the Complainant for the Court to extend the time limit for the making of a complaint. Even if an extension of time was granted, it would still not bring the complaint within the 12-month statutory window. 

1. Deliberations

The preliminary matter for determination by the Court is an application for an extension of time.

The Complainant lodged a complaint under the Act to the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) on 29 December 2023. Therefore, the relevant period for consideration by the Court in assessing a contravention under the Act, having regard to the twelve -month statutory time frame set down at Section 24 of the Redundancy Payments At 1967, is the period from 30 December 2022 to 29 December 2023.

Should the Court find a reasonable cause for the delay in lodging the claim, the timeframe for considering when a contravention occurred can be extended from twelve months to twenty-four months, i.e. 30 December 2021 to 29 December 2023. The Complainant in this case seeks an extension of the timeframe for lodging her complaint. The application for extending time is made on the basis that her failure to present a complaint within time was due to reasonable cause.

The established test for deciding if an extension of time can be granted for reasonable cause is that formulated by this Court in Labour Court Determination DWT0338, Cementation Skanska (Formerly Kvaerner Cementation) v Carroll.  The test was set out as follows:

“It is the Court's view that in considering if reasonable cause exists, it is for the claimant to show that there are reasons which both explain the delay and afford an excuse for the delay. The explanation must be reasonable, that is to say it must make sense, be agreeable to reason and not be irrational or absurd. In the context in which the expression reasonable cause appears in the statute it suggests an objective standard, but it must be applied to the facts and circumstances known to the claimant at the material time. The claimant’s failure to present the claim within the six-month time limit must have been due to the reasonable cause relied upon. Hence there must be a causal link between the circumstances cited and the delay and the claimant should satisfy the Court, as a matter of probability, that had those circumstances not been present he would have initiated the claim in time.”

The test formulated in Cementation Skanska (Formerly Kvaerner Cementation) v Carroll draws heavily on the decision of the High Court in Donal O’Donnell and Catherine O’Donnell v Dun Laoghaire Corporation [1991] ILRM 30. Here Costello J. (as he then was) stated as follows:

“The phrase ‘good reasons’ is one of wide import which it would be futile to attempt to define precisely. However, in considering whether or not there are good reasons for extending the time I think it is clear that the test must be an objective one and the court should not extend the time merely because an aggrieved plaintiff believed that he or she was justified in delaying the institution of proceedings. What the plaintiff has to show (and I think the onus under O. 84 r. 21 is on the plaintiff) is that there are reasons which both explain the delay and afford a justifiable excuse for the delay.”

The burden of proof in establishing the existence of reasonable cause rests with the Complainant.

To discharge that burden, the Complainant must both explain the delay and offer a justifiable excuse for the delay.  There must be a causal connection between the reason for the delay and the failure to present the complaint in time. Finally, the Court must satisfy itself 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 Complainant submits that there was both a valid reason and a justifiable excuse for the delay in lodging the claim as she was suffering from poor medical health during the relevant period. 

The Complainant contends that she suffered from poor health. No details or evidence was presented to the Court to support or corroborate the Complainant’s submission that she suffered from a medical condition during the relevant time, or to explain how such a medical condition may have prevented her from lodging her complaint within the statutory time limit. It is well-established in case law that, when considering a failure to present a complaint in time due to “reasonable cause”, a stated illness without evidence to show how that illness prevented the lodging of a complaint form cannot excuse the lodging of complaints outside of the statutory time limits that apply. 

The Complainant contends that the failure of the Respondent to provide her with paperwork relevant to her appeal contributed to the delay in lodging the appeal, yet she failed to explain how the lack of such paperwork prevented her from lodging the complaint. The WRC complaint form is a simple and straightforward form, that can be completed on-line. There is no requirement to provide any additional paperwork when lodging the initial complaint.

The Complainant contends that she was subject to threatening behaviour by the Respondent during the relevant period. When invited to elaborate, the Complainant referred to telephone calls with the Respondent about the transfer of ownership of the Montessori school the previous year. The Complainant accepted that the calls were heated discussions in relation to a commercial dispute between the parties.  Having regard to the testimony proffered, the Complainant failed to adduce any facts or evidence of behaviour on the part of the Respondent during those conversations that could have prevented the Complainant lodging her complaint under the Act in time.

The Complainant accepted that she made four GDPR Data Access Requests to the Respondent during the relevant time, in addition to two complaints about the Respondent to An Garda Síochána and one complaint about the Respondent to Tusla. The Complainant failed to adequately explain how she was able to progress her commercial dispute with the Respondent and initiate actions in other forums during the relevant time yet was unable to lodge an on-line complaint to the WRC.

In this case the Complaint was lodged to the WRC some twelve months after the alleged contravention under the Act. Where there is a long delay in lodging a complaint, the Complainant is under a greater onus to prove reasonable cause. As set out in Cementation Skanksa a short delay may require only a slight explanation whereas a long delay may require more cogent reasons to explain why the Complainant was prevented from lodging a complaint within the six-month time limit set out in the Act. In the Court’s judgment no valid explanation to properly account for the delay has been furnished that offers an excuse or explains the delay in lodging a complaint form to the WRC on 29 December 2023.

In all the circumstances, the Court finds that the Complainant does not meet the threshold outlined in Cementation Skanksa whereby the statutory timeframe within which he is permitted to refer his complaint under the Act can be enlarged for reasonable cause.

It is well settled that an application for an extension of time must both explain the delay and provide a justifiable excuse for the delay. While the reasons submitted by the Complainant in this case may explain the delay, the Court finds that they do not provide a justifiable excuse for the delay.

In all the circumstances, the Court is of the view that a justifiable basis upon which an extension of time could be granted has not been put forward in this case.

1. Decision

The Court finds that the reasons provided by the Complainant are not sufficient to demonstrate reasonable cause for the delay in filing her complaint with the WRC. Therefore, the Court finds that the within claim was out of time when it was presented to the Workplace Relations Commission and is accordingly statute barred. 

In these circumstances, the Court cannot proceed to hear the substantive matter.

Accordingly, the Court finds that the complaint is not well founded and that the Decision of the Adjudication Officer is upheld.

The Court so decides.

	Signed on behalf of the Labour Court
	Katie Connolly
AM	______________________
11/05/2026	Deputy Chairman

NOTE

Enquiries concerning this Decision should be addressed to Ms Áine Maunsell, Court Secretary.