An Post has been told by the Labour Court to restore wages to staff suspended in a row over the closure of the company's parcels subsidiary, SDS, in January.
It has also instructed the company to backdate to September 2003 pay increases which were denied to a number of staff following a restructuring of SDS.
The court's recommendation paves the way for the closure of SDS with the loss of 270 jobs, and for its operations to be reintegrated into the main business of An Post.
The company's decision to suspend 68 SDS staff in January, for refusing to co-operate with the closure, almost sparked a national postal strike.
The Communications Workers' Union accused the company then of proceeding with the closure before agreement had been reached on a range of staff issues.
The strike was averted following an 11th-hour intervention by the National Implementation Body, which called for a Labour Court investigation.
In a binding recommendation just issued, the court has found in favour of the CWU's position on a large number of issues.
Among the more significant is its decision that the company should restore to SDS staff the wages they lost as a result of their suspension in the January dispute.
The CWU had accused the company at the time of acting provocatively in suspending staff in advance of an agreement on how the SDS closure should be implemented.
In another important decision, the court has backed the CWU's claim that all staff across the company should be allowed to apply, on the basis of seniority, for the severance package on offer as a result of the SDS closure.
An Post had wanted to confine the package in the first instance to staff working in SDS with selection based on "least cost" rather than seniority.
The court also recommended that pay increases of 9.5 per cent in some cases, and 12.5 per cent in others, be paid to workers in a number of areas who co-operated with an SDS restructuring in 2003.
The company claimed that the workers concerned did not qualify for the payment, known as a "change allowance".
In seven out of eight separate claims made by the CWU, the court found in favour of the union.
The payments, to more than 30 workers, are to be backdated to September 2003. The company announced its plan to close SDS, with the loss of 270 jobs, last July. About 100 staff have since availed of voluntary severance or early retirement terms.
