Ex-Hurricane Ophelia – Are You Obliged to Pay Employees Who Missed Work?

by Lucy O Neill, Associate on the Employment & Benefits Team, Mason Hayes & Curran

Due to the ominous weather warnings in place across Ireland in preparation for ex-hurricane Ophelia’s arrival, many businesses  asked employees to only attend work if it was safe for them to do so. As an alternative, employees had been invited to work from home, where possible. Other businesses decided to close their premises entirely for the day as a precaution.

Are employers obliged to pay employees during this time?

Where employees are not required to attend at work, for example, because the employer has closed for the day or the employer asks them not to come in or to leave early, then employees should be paid as normal.

Where the employer’s business remains open and employees are unable to attend due to safety concerns or because they need to take care of children who are off school, then, strictly speaking and subject to any custom and practice in operation within the employer, there is no obligation on employers to pay employees during this time.

What options are open to employers where employees cannot make it into work?

Employers should act reasonably in these circumstances. If an employee cannot make it into work due to the extreme weather, employers may:

• continue to pay employees as normal;
• consider whether the employee can work from home;
• allow employees to take the missed time from their paid annual leave entitlement; or
• agree that employees can make up the missed time at a later date

Can employers discipline employees who don’t make it into work?

In circumstances where a red weather warning is in place across the entire country and individuals are strongly being advised to stay indoors for the day, in our view it could be deemed unreasonable for employers to discipline employees if they do not make it into work.

Conclusion

Employers should take this opportunity to consider and decide their own internal policy in relation to employees who are unable to attend work. Employers should also clearly communicate this policy to all employees to ensure that there are no surprises on pay day.

The content of this article is provided for information purposes only and does not constitute legal or other advice.

About the author

Lucy is an associate on the Employment & Benefits Team at Mason Hayes & Curran. She advises employers and employees on all aspects of employment law, relating to both contentious and non-contentious matters.
Lucy advises clients on a daily basis on a range of workplace issues including recruitment, employment contracts and workplace policies, redundancies, dismissals and pension related queries. Lucy also advises on aspects of commercial transactions including employment due diligence.