The Employment Relations Authority (ERA) recently dealt with a case involving three workers who claimed they were employed as shift workers and were owed compensation for cancelled barge trips.
The matter concerned workers from a sand dredging business who argued they should receive payment when their scheduled trips were cancelled due to weather or other factors.
The workers maintained they were shift workers under employment legislation and entitled to compensation when shifts were cancelled without proper notice.
They argued their work was performed in a system where periods of work were continuous or effectively continuous, meeting the legal definition of shift work.
The employer denied the workers were shift workers, arguing their employment agreements did not require them to undertake shift work and that their work was not performed in a continuous system as required by the legislation.
The employer operated as a sand dredging business providing around 50 to 60 percent of the sand required for Auckland's construction industry.
The company operated two sand barges that were manned by three-person crews comprising a skipper who led the crew and decided if trips needed cancellation, a marine engineer who managed the engine room, and a deckhand who assisted both roles whilst at sea.
The skipper took barges to sand grounds where sand was extracted from the sea and later offloaded by diggers once barges returned to the wharf. This...
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