The Payment of Wages in Irish Employment Law | The Payment of Wages Act, 1991 in Plain English

Disputes about the payment of wages are commonplace.

Most of them are about non payment, late payment, or deductions from wages.

This piece will look at these issues and what redress is available to the employee.

The payment of wages in the employment contract is governed by the Payment of Wages Act, 1991 and this piece of legislation stipulates that wages be paid by cheque, cash, draft, credit transfer and postal order.

The definitions of a “contract of employment” and “wages” in the Act are critically important:

“contract of employment” means— (a) a contract of service or of apprenticeship, and (b) any other contract whereby an individual agrees with another person to do or perform personally any work or service for a third person (whether or not the third person is a party to the contract) whose status by virtue of the contract is not that of a client or customer of any profession or business undertaking carried on by the individual, and the person who is liable to pay the wages of the individual in respect of the work or service shall be deemed for the purposes of this Act to be his employer, whether the contract is express or implied and if express, whether it is oral or in writing;

wages”, in relation to an employee, means any sums payable to the employee by the employer in connection with his employment, including— (a) any fee, bonus or commission, or any holiday, sick or maternity pay, or any other emolument, referable to his employment, whether payable under his contract of employment or otherwise, and (b) any sum payable to the employee upon the termination by the employer of his contract of employment without his having given to the employee the appropriate prior notice of the termination, being a sum paid in lieu of the giving of such notice:

Modes of Payment of Wages

The 8 modes of payment of wages are provided in section 2 of the Payment of Wages, act, 1991.

2.—(1) Wages may be paid by and only by one or more of the following modes:

(a) a cheque, draft or other bill of exchange within the meaning of the Bills of Exchange Act, 1882 ,

(b) a document issued by a person who maintains an account with the Central Bank of Ireland or a holder of a licence under section 9 of the Central Bank Act, 1971 , which, though not such a bill of exchange as aforesaid, is intended to enable a person to obtain payment from that bank or that holder of the amount specified in the document,

(c) a draft payable on demand drawn by a holder of such a licence as aforesaid upon himself, whether payable at the head office or some other office of the bank to which the licence relates,

(d) a postal, money or paying order, or a warrant, or any other like document, issued by or drawn on An Post or a document issued by an officer of a Minister of the Government that is intended to enable a person to obtain payment from that Minister of the Government of the sum specified in the document,

(e) a document issued by a person who maintains an account with a trustee savings bank within the meaning of the Trustee Savings Banks Act, 1989 , that is intended to enable a person to obtain payment from the bank of the sum specified i