Director faces personal liability as employer fails to meet basic obligations

An employer's failure to honour its most fundamental employment obligations has cost it more than $32,000, the Employment Relations Authority ruled on 5 March 2026.

Yang (Helen) Feng arrived in New Zealand on 2 December 2023 to begin work as a construction worker for Auckland-based Dong Construction Limited, which at the time held Accredited Employer status under Immigration New Zealand's Accredited Employer Work Visa scheme. It has since lost that status. She left on 12 March 2024 having never worked a single day or received a cent.

Ms Feng, a former make-up artist with no construction experience, was offered the role via a WeChat video call on 10 October 2023 with Dong Wang, the company's sole director. Mr Wang said the 90-day trial period provision in her agreement gave the company confidence to hire someone without a construction background. No written offer followed the call. The company passed Ms Feng's Individual Employment Agreement (IEA) and a job token to her China-based agent, Xitian (Cici) Huang, so that she could submit them as part of Ms Feng's visa application to Immigration New Zealand. Ms Huang then failed to pass the full IEA on to Ms Feng. Ms Feng only received and signed four pages of the document — the signature page, the employee acknowledgement clause, and two schedules. Those pages did not include the trial period clause or a motor vehicle clause requiring her to hold a...

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