Personal grievance cases cost $12m say employers

Personal grievance claims are costing at least $12 million a year, the Employers and Manufacturers Association estimates.

The association said Employment Relations Authority (ERA) determinations across all types of personal grievance, ranging from redundancy to poor performance, increased in value by 17.3 per cent last year compared with 2002.

But the association's employment relations manager, Peter Tritt, said many more cases were settled before going to the authority.

"The cases settled in mediation or before reaching the authority are usually subject to confidentiality clauses, but by extrapolating from the ERA figures, the total cost of personal grievance claims each year is at least $12 million," he said.

"There is evidence that mediated payments are larger than those determined by the authority."

Of 54 personal grievance claims arising from redundancy cases last year, 57 per cent (or 31) were decided in the employee's favour.

Of 224 decisions relating to misconduct or poor performance 46.8 per cent or 105 went the employee's way.

Regional findings included that:

* Employees in Wellington got bigger personal grievance pay-outs than in Auckland or Christchurch.

* Redundancy compensation claims were more successful in Christchurch than either Auckland or Wellington.

* Wellington had a higher employee compensation success rate for people fired for misconduct or performance reasons.

* In Wellington, compensation for hurt and humiliation was $2000 higher than in Auckland or Christchurch.

* Christchurch's awards for personal grievances arising from redundancy were 45 per cent lower than Auckland and 72 per cent lower than Wellington.

* Christchurch claimants took 8 per cent more personal grievance claims than in 2002.

Council of Trade Unions president Ross Wilson said he did not think the awards were unreasonably high.

He also felt the success rate for employees was surprisingly low.

"You wouldn't expect people to go to the Employment Relations Authority unless they felt they had a genuine grievance.

"I think if anything the figures show surprisingly few personal grievances succeed."

Fewer than 50 per cent of grievances succeeded in misconduct cases. He said his belief that the level of awards was low was shared by the Chief Judge of the Employment Court, Tom Goddard, who had said that they often did not cover legal costs.

Mr Wilson said the level of awards under the ERA compared with awards for similar complaints in civil courts was vastly different.

An ERA case over injury to reputation and injury to feelings - compensation for emotional impact - was comparable to one of defamation where a person could get a six-figure award in the High Court.

"In the Employment Relations Authority you're lucky to get a few thousand dollars.

"What does that say about basic levels of fairness, really?"

- NZPA

Grievance business

* Amounts awarded last year to workers for redundancy cases totalled $325,272.

* Awards relating to misconduct or poor performance reached $924,423.

* The number of decisions rose from 168 in 2002 to 309 last year.

* An unknown number of claims are settled in secret.