These include penalty for failure to provide written employment agreements, failure to keep holiday and leave records and failure to keep wage and time records. "The respondent is to pay a penalty to the Crown in the sum of $25,000 in respect of three categories of breaches of minimum code requirements, plus $71.56 to the Labour Inspectorate as reimbursement of its Authority lodgement fee," said David Appleton, member of the Employment Relations Authority, in his judgement dated December 16, 2016.

It all started on August 14, 2015, when the Labour Inspector received a complaint from a former employee alleging that she had not received the adult minimum wage for each hour worked, had not received an employment agreement, had not been paid at a rate of time and a half for working on a public holiday and had not received her final holiday pay upon her termination. In October 2015, the Labour Inspector carried out a site visit, and interviewed the owner and three employees and, in November 2015, spoke to the respondent’s accountant and retrieved wage and annual leave records in relation to the respondent. Later, the Labour Inspector identified a number of employees of the respondent whose minimum employment requirements were breached, and the case went to ERA.