E tū has won back-pay for holiday and other pay arrears possibly affecting dozens of night-shift workers at bacon processor, Premier Beehive in Carterton.
E tū’s organiser for the site, Mark James says he began chasing the company to check its holiday pay records after a member alerted him that mistakes may have been made.
Thousands of workers nationwide are affected by payroll mistakes related to the wrong calculation of holiday pay.
Many have been paid based on average basic pay, instead of their average real earnings including extra payments for shift work, statutory holidays, overtime and other allowances and entitlements.
Mark says a check revealed the worker was right.
“I noticed his holiday pay didn’t take account of extra earnings from allowances”, he says.
“I queried it with the company, which insisted they paid correctly. I queried it again, and I explained they needed to pay the worker’s leave as relevant daily pay – which is what the person would have earned if they worked that day.”
Mark says in the end the firm reviewed the pay and has admitted it’s made mistakes.
He says he expects to learn soon how many workers are affected, and how much they are owed.
Meanwhile, E tū is also working to clarify the liability of contract companies Spotless and Compass for holiday pay arrears.
Compass is among companies audited by MBIE as it investigates the pay arrears problem.
Organiser, Jill Ovens says E tū also knows of at least one instance of incorrect holiday pay affecting a worker at Spotless.
