Former Roadbridge workers’ payments delayed, says union

Payments to at least 120 former Roadbridge workers have been held up after the construction company’s directors failed to provide key information to the Department of Social Protection, according to trade union Siptu.

Bank of Ireland appointed accountants Grant Thornton as receivers to the Limerick-based building business in March after its board acknowledged it could not meet its liabilities as they fell due.

John Regan, Siptu construction sector organiser, said on Monday that workers were unable to get redundancy and other payments due to them “due to the directors of Roadbridge failing to provide a written statement of company affairs” to the Department of Social Protection.

“This is a statutory requirement and the delay in fulfilling it resulted in the department being unable to process the payments,” he added.

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Siptu confirmed that workers could now contact the Department of Social Protection to begin processing their individual payments.

Mr Regan said that about 120 Siptu members were among those affected, but estimated that about 250 workers in all may have been involved.

Payments due to workers included wages, statutory redundancy entitlements, overtime, holiday pay and others sums due. The department pays workers their entitlements where companies are insolvent.

Mr Regan pointed out that the workers largely had long service and had been particularly loyal to the company. Roadbridge ended their employment on April 28th.

It is understood that the receivers, Stephen Tenant and Nicholas O’Dwyer of Grant Thornton, had difficulty obtaining information from the company that they needed in order to provide the Revenue Commissioners with details of workers’ individual termination dates. The accountancy firm did not comment.

Siptu said this situation aggravated former workers’ problems. Union organiser Stephen Lewis said former staff can access their Revenue Online Service accounts to update their end-of-employment dates.

Once they have done this, they can email their details and confirm the date on which their employment with Roadbridge ended to the Department of Social Protection.

Mr Lewis advised Siptu members experiencing problems with the process to contact union organisers for assistance.

It was not possible to contact Roadbridge’s directors for a comment on Tuesday.