non payment of bonus

I started work last year in a factory but was in fact paid by an employment agency. Prior to starting, the agency advised me that I would be working on a week to week basis but if i stayed on until the "end" of the contract ( end would probably about six months) he would pay me a loyalty payment of 10% of salary earned. When asked to commit this in writing he advised me that as he was being used as a conduit for this payment by factory management and as they were eager to avoid similar payments to there permanent staff, he would be unable to do so. All went well until the contract ended and I noticed that I had not been paid the bonus. After repeated phone calls I was advised that I would be paid next week as they were waiting upon payment from factory management. This went on for several weeks before I was advised that I would not be receiving any bonus payment as factory management felt that I had not worked there long enough. I proceeded to inform the agency that as he was my employer and it was in fact he who had promised me the bonus, then it was his responsibility to pay it. he informed me that he was not in a position to do this as he would have been working at a loss and was not prepared to do this. Do I have any rights in this situation or legal recourse and if so what is the best best way to go about enforcing those rights.

If you were an independent contractor then I don't think that employment law would cover you even if it applied here. Seems like a classic case of a verbal contract and the problem lies with the difficulty in proving that this was made and should be adhered to. Is the bonus enough to bother asking for professional legal advice on it?

If you were paid under PAYE, you have full employment rights, whether or not there was an agency involved.

I think your claim would be against the agency, rather than the "employer".

I think you can go to a Rights Commissioner. If you had an agreement, then they should pay you. You may have to force them to tell lies in front of the Rights Commissioner. I would imagine that they would settle instead of having that hassle.

Check it out [broken link removed]

More [broken link removed] too.

Bear in mind as well that possibly they are in the same position as the factory owner in that he may have promised the bonus to the agency and renaged on that

Regardless I doubt very much if you have a case against the factory owner as you were never employed by them.

As for the agency, again, you have nothing in writing and could end up in a "he said, she said" type arguement. Did you sign an agreement with the agency and did it mention this in any way

I doubt very much that the agency is working on a 10% margin.

Might be worth asking the factory has the agency charged them for the bonus, if they have, then basically they are increasing their profit.

There's a piece of law called Estoppel which binds verbal agreements.

I was a paye worker and the bonus would have been about e2000, worth persueing I think even if I have nothing in writing. It does appear that the factory may have renaged on the bonus as they will not answer my calls but this is not my concern as my claim is with the agency as it was they who had made the promises. If I do apply to the rights commissioner, under what legislation will I be applying.

Did you read the links posted earlier about the rights commissioner etc.?

I did read both links but it appears that I must fill out the form relevant to the legislation under which I will be appealing, eg working time act, carers leave act etc