Employers have obligations to seasonal employees
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Breakfast Business with Enterprise Ireland on Newstalk. I hate to remind you, but Christmas is upon us.
What obligations do employers have when hiring seasonal Christmas staff?
And for many companies, especially retailers, they will hire short-term or seasonal workers in the rush to buy stuff. But employers need to know that even though these workers are only for a few weeks or perhaps months, they still have quite a few obligations to those seasonal employees. Shivra Rush is the head of the law firm Lewis Silken here in Dublin and is on the line. Good morning, Shivra.
Morning, Joe. Thank you very much for asking me on.
Now, tell us about some of these obligations that employers need to have vis-a-vis short term staffers.
Yeah, I think it's important. And you got it bang on when you referred to the casual or seasonal employee, which is what, you know, short term engagements might be referred to.
How does Irish law define fixed-term or casual seasonal employees?
But actually, there's no real legal concept of it. fixed term employees or employees who are engaged for short terms or short projects are protected under the Fixed Term Workers Act in 2003. So, you know, and that basically governs what happens where an employer engages somebody on a short term contract. And it says that employees who are engaged for fixed term can't be treated less favourably than their permanent counterparts. So, for instance, if permanent employees are paid overtime pay over the Christmas period, then fixed term employees are also entitled to that same rate. It also governs then just, you know, if there are successive fixed term contracts, but that's unlikely to happen in a seasonal context.
Are seasonal workers entitled to the same pay and overtime as permanent staff?
It basically says that, you know, you must provide objective justification for where you're offering a fixed-term contract and not a permanent one.
Are these seasonal workers entitled to holidays then at the end? Let's say they only work for six to eight weeks. Do they also accumulate holidays?
They do. So holidays are governed by the Organisation of Working Time Act here, and that basically calculates holidays based on time worked. So it depends on if the employee is full-time, part-time or, again, if seasonal. Generally, the very basic calculation is that they're entitled to 8% of the hours worked by way of annual leave. So there is a provision whereby employees can be paid out their annual leave on termination and that might be the easiest one for the more seasonal engagement.
So if they work seven weeks, they may get the final few days off?
They could, or they could, you know, if the contract expires and terminates at the end of the fixed term, then they're entitled to be paid out whatever accrued annual leave they have that hasn't been taken.
And of course, there are three bank holidays over the Christmas period as well.
Indeed, yeah.
How are holiday entitlements and public holiday pay calculated for short-term workers?
There's Christmas Day, Stephen's Day and New Year's Day.
And they'd have to be paid for those days or what?
It'll depend on if they've worked. If they've worked 40 hours in the five weeks coming up to the public holiday, they'll be entitled to be paid for that or a paid day off. There's a number of options available.
What about workers who do, let's say, six to eight weeks every Christmas with the same firm for a few years? Do these kind of weeks and months kind of add up and accumulate and give them kind of full-time status?
Can repeated seasonal engagements create continuous service or permanent status?
Like permanent status? No, it wouldn't. So in general, if you have a break in service of more than 26 weeks, in some cases it can be, the break in service can be less, but they wouldn't gain, for instance, the one year that would be required under the Unfair Dismissals Act, where at that stage then for an employer to dismiss an employee fairly where they have that one year of service, they need a fair reason and they need a fair process. And the legal entitlements are heightened where an employee has one year of service. I suppose it is worth saying that if, let's say, a seasonal engagement runs into a more permanent one,
What notice and termination rules apply to dismissing seasonal or fixed-term staff early?
it's really important for employers to have the dates of any renewal and if an employee is engaged on a second fixed-term contract on expiry of the first one, they gain more than one year of service.
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Chapters
7 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:01–0:11
2
What obligations do employers have when hiring seasonal Christmas staff?
0:11–0:57
3
How does Irish law define fixed-term or casual seasonal employees?
0:57–1:44
4
Are seasonal workers entitled to the same pay and overtime as permanent staff?
1:44–2:56
5
How are holiday entitlements and public holiday pay calculated for short-term workers?
2:56–3:27
6
Can repeated seasonal engagements create continuous service or permanent status?
3:27–4:09
7
What notice and termination rules apply to dismissing seasonal or fixed-term staff early?
4:09–6:21