Civil servants may get €900 advance ahead of monthly pay

STAFF IN THE Civil Service could receive a €900 net advance in pay to facilitate a move to a monthly payroll system under Government proposals.

As part of the reforms under the Croke Park agreement, the Government is seeking to revise the frequency at which it pays its employees in the Civil Service.

It has told unions it wants to move to a system of paying staff on a monthly basis from March next year.

At present some staff are paid on a weekly basis and others fortnightly.

The Government believes that moving to a monthly payroll system for all 30,000 personnel in the Civil Service could generate savings of €1 million per year.

Under the Government’s plans, the last weekly payment would be made on March 1st, 2013, with the last fortnightly payment on February 28th, 2013.

Unions are unhappy about the planned reforms.

The issue was raised at the annual conferences of both the Civil Public and Services Union, which represents lower-paid staff, and the Public Service Executive Union, which represents middle-grade personnel.

The Civil Public and Services Union has told members that in talks with management representatives, an option of a net advance of €900 of future salary payment, to be paid in the last fortnightly/ weekly payment had been put forward.

The union said that under the proposal this advance payment would have to be paid back in full at €100 per month from April 2013. Under the new plans, the last Friday of every month would become pay day for staff in the Civil Service.

The Civil Public and Services Union told members that it had indicated to management that a move to electronic payslips across all of the Civil Service “could also yield significant savings without necessitating significant hardship to weekly and fortnightly paid staff”.

The Department of Public Expenditure and Reform declined to comment yesterday on the report, details of which were published by the Civil Public and Services Union on its website.

If there is no agreement in direct talks with unions on changing the frequency of payments, management is likely to refer the issue to the Labour Relations Commission and ultimately to the Labour Court for a binding ruling under the terms of the Croke Park agreement.

At its annual conference last April, the Public Service Executive Union urged the Government to reconsider plans to pay staff on a monthly rather than a fortnightly basis.

Union general secretary, Tom Geraghty, said the change being proposed was “of very little significance in its own right”.

Mr Geraghty said he was no expert on payroll systems but it seemed to him that the vast bulk of the costs involved were in processing and administration rather than the number of times a button was pressed to transmit money to the banks.

“Therefore we are at a loss to understand what savings could possibly be involved in moving people to monthly pay,” Mr Geraghty added.