Two employers of Irish company Munster Sealant Services have been convicted and fined for failed to pay employee contributions to the trustee of the Construction Workers Pension Scheme (CWPS) within the statutory timeframe.

Breifne Hanratty and Alan Hennessy, both from Cork were each fined €1,950, with 10 and 12 months to pay respectively, in a prosecution taken by the Pensions Authority.

The Pensions Authority was awarded costs of €500.

The employers were convicted for breach of section 58A(1) of the Pensions Act 1990, as amended.

Hanratty and Hennessy are a partnership trading as Munster Sealant Services with a registered address in Cork, Ireland.

They had deducted pension contributions from the wages and salaries of their employees between July to December 2016, August to December 2017, and January to February 2018 for remittance to the trustees of the CWPS.

However, they had failed to pay the contributions to the trustee of the scheme within the statutory timeframe.

All outstanding employee and employer contributions due to the scheme were repaid before the court date.

Commenting on the conviction in this case, the Pensions Regulator, Brendan Kennedy, said: “This conviction should act as a warning to all employers that the Pensions Authority treats the failure of the employer to remit pension contributions as a very serious offence.

“We advise any employer with outstanding pension contributions to immediately regularise their position.”

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