All employers in New Zealand are under legal obligation to maintain and keep wage, time, leave, and holiday records for each and every employee. Its very important to note that this is a non delegable obligation and ultimately it’s the employer’s responsibility for not having any records.
An employer cannot say a manager was responsible for record keeping or that the accountant was responsible and absolve themselves from liability. An employer will be found liable for not complying with the regulations and would face fines for not having maintained records that comply with regulations. Therefore even if the record keeping is entrusted to another employee such as a manager, it is the employer’s ultimate responsibility to ensure the manager is keeping and maintaining regulation compliant employee records.
These records cannot be simply entered in a book or on a worksheet on a computer. The format of the records need to comply with requirements as stipulated in the Employment Relations Act 2000 and the Holidays Act 2003.
Regulation compliant record-keeping ensures protection to an employer in the event of any challenge or dispute by a disgruntled employee. Please bear in mind that any employee has the legal right to know what records are being kept related to them and have the legal right to ask for the records. If these records are not provided to the employee when they are asked for, the employer can be held liable and face fines.
If you are not maintaining any employee records then start doing so immediately. If you are maintaining records but now wonder whether your records comply with regulations we can assist you in determining whether your employee records are compliant. Please call us if you have any concerns. Its better to play safe rather be penalised at a heavy monetary cost and tainted reputation.
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