Courts

Games studio ordered to pay €5,000 for discrimination against Indian employee

Employer ran into ‘financial difficulties’ and Irish colleagues continued to be paid but Kumar Swapneel Shreyansh was not

Kumar Swapneel Shreyansh brought a series of employment rights complaints against the Galway-based games development company 9th Impact Ltd. Photograph: iStock
Kumar Swapneel Shreyansh brought a series of employment rights complaints against the Galway-based games development company 9th Impact Ltd. Photograph: iStock
Stephen Bourke
Wed Aug 28 2024 - 18:02

A tribunal has ordered a video games studio to pay €5,000 compensation for racial discrimination to an Indian employee who said his employer ran into “financial difficulties” and cut off his salary for months – but kept on paying some of his Irish colleagues.

It brings to nearly €20,000 the total awards made to the worker, Kumar Swapneel Shreyansh, on foot of a series of employment rights complaints against the Galway-based games development company 9th Impact Ltd, where he worked from October 2020 to December 2023 on a salary of €33,756.

Mr Shreyansh is one of four ex-employees of 9th Impact to secure orders for non-payment of wages against the company from the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) this year.

After securing an order for €5,000 in unpaid salary for October and November 2023 from the WRC in March this year, Mr Shreyansh lodged a new complaint under the Payment of Wages Act 1991 claiming for unpaid salary in December 2023 and a failure by the company to compensate him for 12 days of accrued annual leave upon his termination just three days before Christmas that year.

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He also alleged the firm was in breach of the Unfair Dismissals Act 1977 because “no procedures” were followed to terminate his employment – and claimed that 9th Impact had discriminated against him in breach of the Employment Equality Act 1998 on the basis that the company’s failure to pay him was based on race.

His undisputed evidence was that he received no pay for October, November and December 2023, and that having spoken to the head of the company by phone, “it appeared that the other employees received payment but that he did not”.

The company “appeared to be in financial difficulties” and he was required to take on extra responsibilities as colleagues left, Mr Shreyansh told the WRC.

His case was that those who were paid were Irish, while he is Indian, adjudicator Louise Boyle noted in a summary of his evidence. Mr Shreyansh contended the company’s management “decided who to pay, and to not pay him”.

The adjudicator wrote that she was shown copies of correspondence form Mr Shreyansh to 9th Impact between November 2023 and January 2024 raising the pay “anomaly” and asking the company whether it was “based on his race”. The complainant said he received no response to these, she noted.

Ms Boyle wrote that having assessed the evidence and the correspondence, Mr Shreyansh had raised an inference of discrimination in the case, shifting the burden of proof to the respondent company.

“Taking note of all the circumstances of the complaint and [that] the respondent has not attended ... I find the respondent has not met that burden,” Ms Boyle wrote. “I find, therefore, that the complainant has been discriminated against on the grounds of race. Taking into consideration the failures of the respondent and [the] impact on the complainant, I make an award of €5,000,” Ms Boyle wrote.

She also awarded Mr Shreyansh €3,085.20 for his further arrears of wages and €6,500 for 10 weeks’ loss of earnings on foot of a finding of unfair dismissal.

The decision marks the fifth time an order for unpaid salary has been made against 9th Impact since the start of 2024, including Mr Shreyansh’s previous complaint. This latest decision in favour of Mr Shreyansh is by far the largest, and brings the total awarded against the firm to €27,824.61.

The company entered no appearance at any of the five hearings convened by the WRC on foot of employment rights claims against it, according to the decisions published on those cases.