University's €15 rate for correcting dissertations deemed illegal deduction

At the Workplace Relations Commission, Atlantic Technological University has been ordered to pay an assistant lecturer €1,640.88 following a complaint under the Payment of Wages Act 1991. The university had offered Ian Thornton a €15.25 stipend per dissertation for correcting eight postgraduate dissertations at its Sligo campus last summer, totalling €122. Mr Thornton contended that each dissertation required three hours of work and that he was entitled to his contractual hourly rate of €68.37, which would have yielded substantially more. Adjudication officer Brian Dalton found that the university's contractual terms remained applicable when Mr Thornton provided the services beyond the formal end date of his fixed-term contract. The tribunal determined that the non-payment of wages at the contracted hourly rate constituted an illegal deduction. The university was directed to pay the full amount subject to relevant statutory deductions.