WRC Infoline: Anonymous Telephone Service for Employment Rights Information in Ireland, Summaries of Business

Download WRC Infoline: Anonymous Telephone Service for Employment Rights Information in Ireland and more Summaries Business in PDF only on Docsity! ‘Infoline’ operated by the Workplace Relations Commission’s Information and Customer Services Unit (ICS), Ireland Title of the policy or measure (in English) ‘Infoline’ – operated by the Information and Customer Services Unit (ICS) at the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) • Country Ireland • Sectors All • What groups are targeted by the measure - Employers (directly targeted) - Workers (directly targeted) - Legal Practitioners (directly targeted) - Employer representatives (directly targeted) - Employee representatives (directly targeted) • Purpose of measure Changing attitudes: awareness raising • Short sentence summarising the measure The WRC’s Information and Customer Services Unit (ICS) operates a dedicated anonymous phone number or Infoline (Lo-call*: 1890 80 80 90) during working hours (930 – 1700 hrs) Monday to Friday which provides impartial information to callers on employment rights, employment equality, equal status and related legislation.i Background • Background context driving the implementation of the measure The purpose of the WRC is “to be a world leader in delivering a workplace relations service to provide for variable means of redress, effective enforcement within a reasonable period, and to reduce the cost to employees and business when processing issues through industrial relations and employment rights machinery in a user-friendly, independent, effective, impartial and cost-effective manner.” Within this context one of the services offered, among others, includes information provision on employment rights and entitlements in the form of the Information and Customer Services (ICS) Unit which provides an Infoline for these purposes.ii • When was the measure implemented? (including start date and end date/ongoing) The WRC ‘Infoline’ has been in operation since the commencement of the WRC on the 1 October 2015 and is ongoing.iii • Names(s) of authorities/bodies/organisatio ns involved Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) • Scope of the measure (a pilot project, nationwide, regional wide) National • Type of (policy) measure Tool • Key objectives of the measure General objectives: - . The aim is to provide both employers and employees with the information they require to ensure that their workplace operates to the best standards in terms of compliance with employment rights and industrial relations legislation. Specific objectives: - To provide information on an individual basis to employers and employees and members of the public on employment rights and entitlements and industrial relations issues; - To provide clear, accurate, relevant information delivered in a friendly and professional manneriv; - To provide information on redress for members of the public who have been discriminated against by service providers; - To provide information on employment permits and making an application for an employment permit. Specific measure • Description of how the measure operates in practice Information on rights and entitlements under employment legislation is provided by the WRC Information and Customer Service Unit, free of charge.v The Information and Customer Services Unit has set up a dedicated anonymous telephone call-in service, Infoline. • Infoline is manned by experienced WRC employees (Information Officers). It operates Monday to Friday from 930 hours to 1700 hours, and has a built- in automated feature for calls received after-hours. • The service is based in Carlow but has Information Officers located in all the regional offices including, Dublin, Sligo, Shannon and Cork. Call management technology delivers an integrated service across multiple geographic centres. • The Carlow contact centre is manned by a staff of 6 WRC employees (Information Officers) from a wider body of 24 staff who work two days on phones and are involved in other activities for the remainder of the week e.g. processing and answering e-mail enquiries. • The Information Officers provide information related to labour law, mediation, adjudication, work permits (how to apply for one and the status of permit requests), published decisions of the WRC and Labour Court decisions, redundancy and also on how to use the online complaint forms provided on the WRC’s website. • Most enquiries are related to employment rights, employment permits, terms of employment, payment of wages, conciliation, redundancy and unfair dismissal etc. • When an interested party dials the dedicated phone number s/he is greeted with a welcome message and is informed of the possible cost of the call. • The call flow issues priority status to calls that have been on hold the longest and provides recorded information to the caller about the service that will be provided by the WRC. • Before getting through to one of the WRC’s Information Officers, callers can listen to a list of pre-recorded answers that might provide the required information. • For each call the WRC Information Officers use a network access database to record specific information related to the call such as the status of the person calling (employee, employer), the region (or county) the enquiry relates to, the sector of the activity and the type of enquiry.