ESB technicians claim overtime pay due to them was held up as penalty for not signing up to timekeeping app

John Keenan, representing the Independent Workers Union (IWU), told the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) that the technicians were “entitled to be completely aggrieved” about being owed thousands.

The WRC has heard the ESB said its payroll department couldn’t keep up with 236 paper timesheets being sent in per week by staff who were refusing to use the new app.

It also heard that the technology previously used by the ESB to process paper timesheets had become “obsolete” and was disposed of.

The workers, all members of the IWU, all lodged complaints under the Payment of Wages Act and the Terms of Employment (Information) Act against ESB Networks DAC.

ESB Networks denies the claims and says the complaints are now “moot” because the workers have been paid everything they were owed when they lodged their complaints.

Ten test cases were selected for a WRC adjudication on the matter, with the last case in the series, that of north Dublin-based network technician Stephen Darling, heard yesterday afternoon.

The other test cases selected were complaints by fellow network technicians Sean Meyler, Liam O’Grady, Gerard Tuohy, Oisín Mahon, Greg Victory, Des Summerville, Michael Dolan, Brian Baitson and Shane Flynn.

Mr Darling said he was enrolled on the MyTime app in April 2021 and told he wasn’t allowed to submit a paper timesheet any more.

The use of the app had been part of the proposed “Building a Better Climate” agreement between trade unions and the ESB.

Mr Darling told his supervisor he wanted to use paper timesheets but was refused, he said.

“We agreed I’d lodge a grievance and I would stay on the app,” he said, which he did in August.

After the grievance was rejected in November he stopped using the app and went back to submitting paper timesheets.

In his November 8 payslip, he said he noticed a difference in his wages, with certain allowances missing.

Mr Darling said he had worked late on certain jobs during this time and these were not reflected in the payslip either.

When he sent his trade union his estimate of losses for their bulk complaint to the WRC on November 21, 2021, he said he was due approximately €1,250 – later clarifying this figure as €1,235.

By the end of the year, his estimate of the back-pay due had risen to €2,500, he said, adding that a further deficit had built up in early 2022.

Delays to the processing of payments were continuing, he said, and he believed some €1,800 to €2,000 was still outstanding.

He said his payslips were unclear.

“I don’t know what I’m given. Stuff is coming and I don’t know what it’s for,” he said.

Senior counsel for ESB Networks, Lorna Lynch, put it to Mr Darling in cross-examination that the company had written to him in respect of the sum of €1,235 outstanding when he put in his WRC complaint, stating that these monies had all been processed and paid to him by April 2022.

“I recall plenty of payments but I’m not sure which ones are which,” Mr Darling said.

“You can’t say to Mr Dolan (the adjudicating officer), ‘I haven’t been paid for these weeks’,” counsel said.

“That’s correct,” Mr Darling replied, adding: “Since we were here the last day it seems to have got an awful lot better.”

He said the payments had been coming more quickly, but that he didn’t receive any back money in his most recent payslip.

Ms Lynch asked him whether he had made inquiries with ESB Networks’ payroll department.

“I spoke to the senior manager in charge – he said the girls are snowed under,” he replied.

At a previous hearing in the group of claims on June 15, ESB Networks employee relations officer Darragh Horan said the implementation of the MyTime app had been moved up because the technology being used to process paper timesheets was “obsolete” and the software supplier was no longer supporting the product.

He said the specialist scanner used to process the forms, which had been in use some 15 or 20 years, had been disposed of.

Mr Horan said all paper timesheets now had to be entered into the ESB accounting system by hand, one by one, by six staff in its Galway office – and that they could only manage about 120 to 130 payslips a week when up to 236 were being sent in.

“It’s a very labour-intensive process,” he said.

Cross-examining Mr Horan, the union representative Mr Keenan said: “I worked in payroll back in the day – we processed 7,000 paysheets per week manually,” Mr Keenan said, and put it to Mr Horan that 236 should be manageable.

“We do have over 8,000 staff,” Mr Horan said. “We also process approximately 10,000 pensions.”

He added that there was a “complexity” to processing the network technicians’ timesheets.

“What efforts have been made to reduce that, to fulfil the obligation to pay?” Mr Keenan asked.

“I don’t think you’ve been listening to the evidence I’ve been giving you. We had a large number of timesheets submitted November and December 2021. We’d hundreds of timesheets coming in every week… We’re trying to process them as fast as we can,” he said.

‘I’d do it in half a day’

“We don’t want to see people waiting on overtime payments, but ultimately these guys have made the decision not to use the MyTime system which is the only system available to pay overtime and allowances,” he added.

Mr Keenan put it to Mr Horan that the company had chosen not to renew the software licence for the payroll scanning system in the first quarter of 2021, which the witness confirmed.

Under questioning from adjudicating officer Jim Dolan, Mr Horan said some 236 network technicians had initially refused to use the MyTime app but that this number had gradually reduced to 185.

Summing up the union’s case yesterday, Mr Keenan said: “These are people who want to get out and do their best to serve the community. It is very regrettable that they have become disenchanted with their employer.”

He said the use of the MyTime app was a component of an industrial agreement called Building a Better Climate which was not approved until March 2022 by a ballot of members of other trade unions at ESB Networks – but not IWU members.

“The ballot in favour of the agreement was a majority of 336 in circumstances were there were 432 IWU members. It’s relevant. It’s the elephant in the room. It cannot be ignored,” he said.

His members’ position was that the company was not entitled to “enforce” a change to their working conditions without agreement.

He said the delays to the payments were in effect a “penalty” for those who did not sign up for the MyTime app and that the company had acted “deliberately” in the matter.

Mr Keenan submitted that complainants lost on average €800 per week with arrears building to several thousand – and in the case of one complainant, peaking at €15,000 – but added that his members had to concede the situation had improved since.

He said they were “entitled to be completely aggrieved” about being owed thousands.

He said he didn’t accept the evidence of Mr Horan, the HR officer, who said the payroll department could not keep up with 236 timesheets a week.

“I’d do it in half a day,” he said.

Ms Lynch, for ESB Networks, said she would focus on the evidence in the cases before the adjudicating officer.

“Contrary to Mr Keenan’s opinion, the courts have found the ESB cannot be forced to negotiate with the IWU,” she said.

She said the vast majority of ESB workers at the grade “don’t agree” with the IWU position.

“A change to a digital app is not a change to the terms and conditions of employment, but a work practice,” she argued.

Ms Lynch added that the WRC could only consider the statutory pay claims retrospectively from the date of their submission in November 2021, and that Mr Keenan had failed to make out a case that the cognisable period should be extended up to the hearing date.

“None of the 10 employees have presented you with evidence of the amount of money owed to them pre-complaint and (which) is still owing to them,” she said.

She said the company had confirmed that any payment due prior to the submission of the complaints had already been processed, and none of the complainants had disputed that.

“All those claims are now moot,” she said.

Adjudicating officer Jim Dolan thanked the witnesses for their evidence and asked the complainants to pass on his thanks to their colleagues who had spoken at previous hearings.

He said he would give four weeks for further submissions by the parties before starting work on his decisions, adding that he expected to issue them to the parties no later than mid-September.