Union representing cleaners at London hospital gives employer deadline to fix payroll issues

The union representing cleaning staff at London Health Sciences Centre has given their employer, Sodexo, until Friday to resolve payroll issues that led over 50 workers to not receive full pay for nearly a month. 

Maria McFadden, business representative for Labourers International Union of North America (LiUNA) Local 1059 tells CBC News that if the error isn't fixed by then, the union will start a grievance process against Sodexo. 

A union grievance is filed when there's infractions against employees, which is the violation of a collective agreement. It includes workers being shortchanged on their wages. 

The inconsistent paycheques are due to a ransomware attack on the American-based Kronos payment software which Sodexo uses for payroll, that started about four weeks ago. 

McFadden said each worker is owed different amounts depending on the days and hours they worked. These range anywhere from $300 to 25 hours of work missing on their paystub for the recent pay period on Dec. 31. 

"That day the [Sodexo] rep got about 54 calls from different folks that hadn't been paid properly and till today's date, they still have not been paid what is owed to them," she said. 

McFadden said Sodexo notified Local 1059 of the issue right away and the union has been very understanding, but believes that enough time has passed, and this needs to be dealt with.  

"It's now been four weeks, so it's been a little while and our expectation is that Sodexo needs to get things done so that corrections can be made," she said. 

Workers make about $20 per hour on a bi-weekly basis. She is especially concerned that workers will struggle to pay the bills that are piling up from the holiday season. 

"Come January 1st people have bills to pay and rent is due, so it's a very nasty time of the year for workers to be going through this, it's a very difficult situation" she added. 

McFadden highlights that the cleaners are continuing to work because they want to help out an already burdened hospital system during a pandemic.  

"It's a hospital setting so people feel they are obligated to work and want to take the best step they can and help others," she said. 

She says some workers are turning to get cash loans in order to make ends meet because they are really concerned that they haven't been paid properly. 

McFadden hopes that Sodexo will do right by their employees. "I hope they have some compassion and get this fixed, but time will tell and we'll see what happens on Friday," she said.