Novopay causes festive season hangover

21 December 2012
Immediate Release

Novopay causes festive season hangover

There’s been no fun in the lead-up to the festive season for teachers who are suffering Novopay hangovers.

NZEI Te Riu Roa National Secretary Paul Goulter says there are problems dating back to Labour weekend for some NZEI members and this last pay cycle for the year has many mistakes in holiday pay.

Mr Goulter says the Ministry is continuing to downplay the extent of the problems and this is causing stress and anger among NZEI members who are now ringing from home with their holiday pay issues.

“Our call centre is still being inundated by calls from distressed members trying to sort out their holiday pay,” Mr Goulter says.

This pay also affects teachers in relieving and fixed-term positions where their employment terminates at the end of the year.

Members are reporting a variety of problems with this pay cycle including underpayment and no payment of holiday pay.

“We are still also having concerns over third party issues such as superannuation and student loan repayments being reconciled and paid to the receiving agency,’’ says My Goulter.

NZEI is working closely with the Ministry to resolve the outstanding individual issues and will have a skeleton staff in its support centre over the Christmas period. The Ministry’s 0800 number will also be operating and NZEI is also referring members to this.

NZEI has called on the Ministry of Education to stop being in denial about the extent of the Novopay problems and to get on with sorting them out.

“Let’s be absolutely clear, there are major systemic problems with Novopay that are not going away. For instance, just about every school in the country will have unresolved issues around support staff entitled to qualifications allowances. Those staff still haven’t been paid their correct entitlement for Labour Weekend. This is despite assurances that the problem would be resolved by 28th of November – a date that has since been put back due to a so-called reprioritization.’’

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