Financial technology consultancy Bankhawk has been ordered to pay €64,000 in commission it withheld from a salesman as “leverage” to get him to sign a non-disclosure agreement after failing to retain the original.
Ian Armstrong, a sales lead with the company until he was made redundant in March 2024, was awarded the sum on foot of a complaint under the Payment of Wages Act 1991.
Mr Armstrong had a basic salary of €72,000 a year and a right to 10 per cent commission on sales at the time of his termination, he told the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC).
Having started at the company in March 2017, Mr Armstrong’s evidence was that by the third quarter of 2023, he was responsible for bringing in three of the firm’s biggest clients and generating over a million euro in revenue.
He said he was due some €117,680 for bringing in the business, but the CEO, Brian Weakliam, wanted to defer paying to strengthen the company’s financial position while seeking investment.
They reached a deal to pay half the sum in the fourth quarter of 2023 and the rest in the first quarter of 2024
“to soften the impact of €117,680 on 2023 performance” so that Mr Weakliam would be in a position to pursue “fundraising from a position of strength”.
Bankhawksubmitted that Mr Armstrong, made “no sales whatsoever” in 2023 and put the company “under immense financial pressure”.
It started a redundancy process with him in January 2024, the tribunal heard.
The firm issued him with notice of redundancy on the basis of a statutory redundancy calculation on 16 February last year. Mr Armstrong told the tribunal that the firm also presented him with a “settlement agreement” at this time.
This included a waiver of claim to the WRC and what he described as an “enhanced” non-disclosure agreement (NDA) compared to the one he had signed when he started work.
Mr Armstrong ultimately received a €9,036 severance package in April 2024.
The company told the tribunal at a hearing that Mr Armstrong had said he didn’t have a copy of the original NDA that came with his contract of employment and declined to sign again when it asked him early in 2023.
However, in later correspondence with the WRC, the company stated that it had been unable to turn up a signed copy of the original NDA either.
Adjudication officer Patricia Owens found there was “clear evidence” that the parties had agreed on a rate of 10 per cent commission in 2022 and that Mr Armstrong’s calculations were correct.
“It is evident that the respondent did not have proper procedures in place for the management of relevant employee documentation and this responsibility cannot be shifted to the complainant,” she added.
She awarded Mr Armstrong €57,680 for the commission payment due at the end of the first quarter in 2024 and a further €6,480 for commission on the sales concluded before his employment ended – a total of €64,080.
