Staffline Recruitment Ltd (Represented by Irish Business and Employers' Confederation) v Anna Zawadzka

• Jurisdiction: Ireland
• Judgment Date: 21 November 2018
• Judgment citation (vLex): [2018] 11 JIEC 2105
• Docket Number: FULL RECOMMENDATION DETERMINATION NO.AWD186 ADJ-00005514 CA-00007942-002
• Date: 21 November 2018
• Court: Labour Court (Ireland)

Labour Court

FULL RECOMMENDATION

AWC/18/1

DETERMINATION NO.AWD186

ADJ-00005514 CA-00007942-002

PARTIES:

Staffline Recruitment Limited (Represented by Irish Business and Employers' Confederation)

and

Anna Zawadzka

DIVISION:

Chairman: Mr Haugh

Employer Member: Mr Murphy

Worker Member: Ms Tanham

SECTION 25 (2), PROTECTION OF EMPLOYEES (TEMPORARY AGENCY WORK) ACT, 2012

SUBJECT:

1 1. Appeal of Adjudication Officer Decision No.ADJ-00005514 CA-00007674-002.

BACKGROUND:

2 2. The Employer appealed the Decision of the Adjudication Officer to the Labour Court. A Labour Court hearing took place on 26 October 2018. The following is the Court's Determination:-

DETERMINATION:

3 This is an appeal on behalf of Staffline Recruitment Limited (‘the Respondent’) from a decision of an Adjudication Officer (ADJ-00005514; CA-00007674-002, dated 12 April 2018) under the Protection of Employees (Temporary Agency Work) Act 2012. The Respondent's Notice of Appeal was received on 29 June 2018. The Court heard the appeal in Dublin on 26 October 2018.

Preliminary Issue

4 The Respondent's Notice of Appeal was received outside the 42-day time limit provided for in section 44(3) of the Workplace Relations Act 2015 (‘the 2015 Act’). The Respondent applied to the Court to extend the time under section 44(4) of the 2015 Act. It submits that its failure to give notice to the Court of its intention to appeal the Adjudication Officer's decision was due to exceptional circumstances.

5 Those exceptional circumstances, in the Respondent's submission, comprise of the following sequence of events:

•

• The Respondent's business address changed on 24 March 2017 from Naas to Gowan House Unit 8, Carriglea Business Park, Naas Road, Dublin 12;

• The Respondent set up a forwarding system with An Post for a period of six months from the date of the change of office address;

• The first hearing before the Adjudication Officer took place on 13 April 2017 and both parties were in attendance; (IBEC was not on record for the Respondent at this time); the matter was adjourned to a later date;

• The Respondent's HR Director wrote to the Workplace Relations Commission on 24 April 2017 to notify it that she was the main point of contact for all cases in which the Respondent was a party; she supplied her office address in Derry and her email address to the WRC but did not notify the WRC of the change of office address from Naas to Dublin 12;

• The WRC notified the Respondent- by letter dated...