Page 57 - Workplace Relations Guide to Employment Law

apply. Payments are made from the Social certain exceptions, see below) have had at
Insurance Fund. least a year’s continuous service with the
same employer.
EMPLOYEES COVERED BY THE A Workplace Relations Commission
SCHEME Adjudication Officer may consider whether
The scheme covers employees who are the employment of a person on a series of 2
over 16 years of age and are in employment or more contracts of employment, between
which is insurable for all benefits under which there was no more than 26 weeks of
the Social Welfare Acts at the date of a break, was for the purpose of avoidance
termination of employment; this includes of liability by the employer under the Acts.
employees over 66 years of age who are in Where it is so found, the length of the various
employment, which but for their age, would contracts may be added together to assess
be insurable for all benefits under the Social the length of service of an employee for
Welfare Acts. eligibility under the Acts.

Persons engaged through employment
MAKING A CLAIM agencies are covered by the scope of the
legislation. For the purposes of the Unfair
Claims are made through the person Dismissals Acts, the party (end user) hiring
legally appointed to wind up the business the individual from the employment agency
(normally the Liquidator or Receiver), is deemed to be the employer.
who will certify the claims from the
records available, and submit them to
the Insolvency Payments Section of the The Acts do not cover employees on fixed
Department of Employment Affairs and term or fixed purpose contracts whose
Social Protection to be processed. When employment terminates when the contract
expires or the purpose ceases, provided the
the claims have been processed, payments contract, signed by both parties, specifies that
are made to the Liquidator, Receiver, etc., the Unfair Dismissals Acts do not apply to the
who will pay the employees concerned, expiry only of the contract. If a series of two
having made any statutory tax or other or more of these contracts, between which
deductions
there was no more than a 3 month break, is
considered to have existed for the purpose
of avoidance by the employer of liability
Dismissal under the Acts, they will be added together in
calculating continuous service of an employee
The Unfair Dismissals Acts 1977 to 2015 for eligibility under the Acts. Apart from this,
provide protection for employees from being any provision in an agreement, whether a
unfairly dismissed from their jobs by laying contract of employment or not, to exclude or
down criteria by which dismissals are judged limit the application of the Acts is void.
to be unfair and by providing an adjudication
system and redress for an employee whose The Acts also do not cover, for example,
dismissal has been found to be unjustified. designated apprenticeships where the
The Acts apply to employees who (with employee is let go in the month following

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