Firm fined $14,000 for not paying employee wages on time
Updated at 6.47pm: A construction consultancy firm on Tuesday was fined $14,000 for failing to pay a departing employee wages on time.
The Tsuen Wan Magistrate?s Court heard that Pypun Engineering Consultants, a construction planning and engineering consultation firm, failed to pay the employee seven days after the termination of employment. This is the period legally required by the Employment Ordinance for wages to be paid. The wages overdue were about $29,000, the court heard.
The Labour Department launched the prosecution on behalf of the employee.
A government spokesman said the ordinance regulated wages due upon expiry of the last day of the wage period ? or upon termination of employment.
He stressed that wages had to be paid as soon as was ?practicable? ? but no later than seven days.
Any employer who fails to do so ?wilfully and without reasonable excuse? was liable to a maximum fine of $200,000 and imprisonment for a year, he added.
There have been a number of recent cases of employees in Hong Kong losing their jobs or ending their employment, but still being owed their wages.
