A MAN who worked for market research company Ipsos MRBI was made redundant after it became “inevitable” that his job would be made superfluous due to advances in technology, an employment appeals tribunal has heard.
According to Ipsos MRBI managing director Damian Loscher – who testified yesterday before the tribunal – developments in technology, coupled with the recession, led to Brian O’Riordan from Finglas, Dublin, being made redundant from his job as a data entry clerk. Mr O’Riordan had held the job for more than 11 years when he was made redundant in March 2010.
Mr Loscher said Mr O’Riordan’s main tasks included inputting data collected from interviews into the computer system as well as filing and retrieving the original marking paper used in interviews for use in the future.
However, online questionnaires and interviews conducted with portable electronic devices, such as laptops and tablets, were becoming more popular, he said.
These methods were more cost-effective because they bypassed the need for a data entry clerk as the data was put into the system at the point of questioning, he told the tribunal. “The rise in online questionnaires was very predictable . . . it was inevitable. What was driving it was simply costs.”
The hearing will resume on March 26th.