A wedding shop sales assistant who was made redundant after 17 years’ service is entitled to €32,000 in compensation after the business failed to honour an enhanced redundancy agreement she had with a previous employer, the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) has ruled.
All of Natasha Comerford’s employment terms, including an enhanced redundancy pay-off of five weeks’ salary for each year of service, were transferred from her previous employer to the new business in 2008 under the Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) regulations, or Tupe for short.
But she was only offered statutory terms of two weeks’ pay for each year of service when she was made redundant from her job in the Wedding Shop in November 2020, the WRC was told.
At a hearing, WRC adjudication officer Jim Dolan heard that Ms Comerford’s union, Mandate, had negotiated “a long-standing collectively agreed redundancy package of five weeks’ pay per year of service” with the previous business, which was signed shortly after the claimant commenced her employment in July 2003.
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Five years later, in April 2008, Ms Comerford was advised by her then employer “that they intended to transfer her to the employment of the respondent” — named as “Wedding List Solutions Limited (in voluntary liquidation)” in papers submitted to the WRC — via Tupe regulations.
In his submission to the statutory body, Mandate official Robert McNamara, representing Ms Comerford, said the claimant had been advised by the previous business that “all of her terms and conditions and collective agreements would be honoured by the respondent upon transfer and thereafter”.
After three years’ employment with the new company, Ms Comerford was offered but did not take up redundancy terms of five weeks’ pay per year of service — the same terms her union had agreed with her previous employer.
The offer, the hearing was told, clearly demonstrated “that the terms of the collective agreement vis-a-vis redundancy had clearly and unambiguously transferred” from Ms Comerford’s previous employer to the respondent.
However, Ms Comerford and her colleagues were informed by letter that they were being “made redundant on statutory terms” when the respondent commenced redundancy consultations with its workforce in November 2020.
Declan Hanly, on behalf of the respondent’s liquidators, told the hearing that there was “no evidence” to show Ms Comerford was entitled “to enhanced redundancy pay” as part of the terms and conditions of her employment.
“The claimant was paid statutory redundancy in line with all other employees made redundant,” Mr Hanly said.
The WRC was also told that respondent ceased to trade in March 2021 and was liquidated seven months later.
The last financial statement from the business, which was filed in December 2019, indicated a deficit on the balance sheet of €850,820. This amount subsequently increased to €962,141 when the respondent was liquidated.
In his decision, published on Wednesday, Mr Dolan noted Ms Comerford had received a letter from her old employer informing her that “her employment would transfer to the respondent with effect from May 23rd, 2008″.
Mr Dolan also observed that the collective agreement the complainant had signed with her old employer “was still in place at the time of her redundancy”.
“I have considered the written and verbal submissions from both parties and now conclude that the complaint as presented is well founded,” he said.
Ordering the respondent to pay €32,000 in compensation to Ms Comerford, Mr Dolan said the money was to be paid within 42 days of his decision.
The previous business was not named in the ruling.
