The Christchurch Casino has been made to pay for a mistake it made in preparing an employment contract. The contract provided for a salary of $34,500 per year, but failed to record that the employee would be paid a pro-rated amount to reflect her part-time hours. The Employment Tribunal ordered the Casino to pay the employee $34,500 per year even though she was a part-timer.

The Casino employed Margaret-Ann Winter as a full-time dealer.

In 1997, Ms Winter requested to reduce her hours of work. The Casino agreed, and gave her a new employment contract for a part-time dealer working four eight-hour shifts per week. Ms Winter signed and returned a copy of the contract.

In early 1998, Ms Winter requested that her hours of work be further reduced to three eight-hour shifts per week. The Casino agreed and gave her another employment contract reflecting this change, which she signed and returned.

Despite signing the new contract, the Casino did not reduce Ms Winter's hours and she continued working four eight-hour shifts per week.

In August 1999, the Casino promoted Ms Winter to the position of inspector. It gave her a new remuneration schedule for her contract. The new schedule contained an error in that it stated that Ms Winter would be paid $34,500 per year. Ms Winter pointed out the error and she was given a corrected schedule stating that her salary would be $34,500 per year.

The Casino paid Ms Winter $34,500 per year pro-rated to reflect her part-time hours. Ms Winter did not realize that her salary was being paid pro-rata, and believed that the amount she received each week would, over the course of a year, total $34,500. This situation continued for many months.

Ms Winter eventually discovered that her salary was being paid on a pro-rated basis, and brought a claim against the Casino for arrears of wages being the difference between what she had been paid and $34,500 per year.

The Casino defended the claim contending that the $34,500 per year salary was for full-time inspector, and that this amount had to be pro-rated to reflect Ms Winter's part-time hours. It also argued that the reference to $34,500 in her remuneration schedule was an error.

The Tribunal rejected the Casino's arguments. "The Tribunal's obligation is to ascertain the intention of the parties as they are expressed by the words used in the contract. If I am able to ascertain a clear contractual intention from the words used then I am required to give effect to it. It is not up to the Tribunal to give words something other than their clear clean meaning, or to infer that the parties really meant something different from what they have stated in the contract," the Tribunal said.

The Tribunal also rejected the Casino's argument regarding the alleged error. "The terms of the contract are clear and required the Casino to make payment to Ms Winter at the rate of $34,500 per year. To find in those circumstances there has been an error in terms of clause 3.3 would be to undermine completely the principles of contractual interpretation to which I have previously referred by giving effect to the Casino's plea that it should not be bound to the clear terms to which it had previously agreed," it said.

The Tribunal ordered the Casino to pay Ms Winter arrears of wages totaling $4,350.35 plus interest.