Sally met up with her sister Samantha and her niece Sarah for coffee at a local café. Sally was excited to see Sarah, as she had recently landed herself her first weekend job working as a waitress in another café in town. Sarah, normally bright and chatty, barely looked up when Sally arrived.
Sally gently asked Sarah how things are going and whether she is enjoying her new job. Sarah quietly answered that she no longer worked at the café. She explained that even though she really enjoyed working at the café, her boss didn’t give her a written employment agreement recording the terms of employment that they agreed on, he never paid her, and he didn’t give her copies of her timesheets when she asked for them. Sarah was too embarrassed to keep asking her boss to give her the documents and to pay her, because he made her feel like she was annoying him and wasting his time. She started feeling really uncomfortable at her job and eventually just stopped going in and she hadn’t heard from her boss since.
Clearly annoyed by Sarah’s work situation, Samantha said that she was going to post about the café and their poor treatment on the local grapevine page.
Sally recalled an article written by Edmonds Judd dealing with defamation and recommended that Samanatha and Sarah rather set up a meeting with her lawyer at Edmonds Judd to get advice on how to resolve the issue.
The team at Edmonds Judd confirmed that Sarah is entitled to all of the basic rights that protect employees, regardless of her age and that this was her first job. Sarah’s boss breached the terms of her employment agreement.
Sarah’s boss was required to:
- provide her with a written employment agreement;
- pay her according to the agreement which should provide her hourly wage, frequency of pay and method of pay;
- keep records in a written form showing for example: time records (including days and hours worked), wage records (including wages paid and how the wages were calculated), and holiday and leave records;
- record Sarah’s age in his usual wage and time records; and
- provide Sarah with copies of her employment records if requested.
The team at Edmonds Judd explained to Sarah that given her age and limited time working for her employer, she is entitled to the starting-out minimum wage, but that the parties should have recorded her hourly rate and terms of payment in her employment agreement.
Even though a couple of weeks had passed since she left her employment, she had the right to approach her boss about her dispute. Employees must raise their personal grievance with their employer within 90 days of the issue arising or coming to their attention. If she can’t resolve her dispute with him directly, she is entitled to apply to the Employment Relations Authority for assistance to resolve the dispute.
Her lawyer explained that the first step is to give her boss a written letter setting out what her personal grievance is and how she suggests that the parties resolve it. If communicating with her boss directly does not resolve the matter, then she can apply to the Employment Relations Authority.
Kristin O’Toole
