Hundreds of HSE workers left without wages by new payroll system
The Government has been warned a new HSE payroll system has the potential to "cause industrial conflict" after it emerged some ambulance workers have been left without thousands of euro in wages.
During the Dáil public accounts committee, Social Democrats co-leader Catherine Murphy warned the issue has the potential to be a repeat of the decade-old PPARS fiasco.
In a letter to the PAC in recent days, a national ambulance service member said for the past 10 weeks hundreds of HSE workers have not been paid their full wages because of problems with a new payment system.
The ambulance worker wrote that "ambulance, psychiatric service, community care" and other employees "are being left short of hundreds of euros of wages each week as it appears the new payroll system can't process" their income properly.
"Staff have been continually left short of overtime, bank holiday payments, and Saturday and Sunday allowances. Some staff have not been paid wages at all, and are owed thousands of euro," the ambulance worker said, adding people with mortgages and childcare bills "are being fobbed off with false assurances" and may be forced to take industrial action.
Highlighting the issue during the PAC meeting, Catherine Murphy said she understands the new payroll system is being trialled in one part of the country and has produced a significant difficulty for some staff.
"There will always be glitches and I completely accept that, but there appears to be an inflexibility to it [the new system]," she said.
"If it's going to be rolled out to the rest of the HSE, it has the potential to cause industrial conflict because people are not being paid or not in a timely way."
She said she believes the current problems with the new system mean it is "not fit for purpose".
