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Employment Relations Act 2000

Personal grievances, disputes, and enforcement - Personal grievances

114: Raising personal grievance

You could also call this:

"Telling your employer about a problem you want fixed, and what happens next"

If you want to raise a personal grievance, you must tell your employer within a certain time period, unless your employer agrees to hear it later. You raise a grievance with your employer as soon as you tell them, or someone who works for them, that you have a problem you want them to fix. Your employer might not agree to hear your grievance if you tell them after the time period has ended.

If your employer does not agree to hear your grievance, you can ask the Authority for permission to raise it late. The Authority will listen to your employer's side of the story and might let you raise your grievance late if they think there were exceptional circumstances that stopped you telling your employer earlier, and if they think it is fair to do so, as explained in section 115. They will also consider if it is just to let you raise your grievance late.

If the Authority says you can raise your grievance, they will tell you and your employer to try to resolve the problem using mediation. You cannot take your grievance to the Authority or the court more than three years after you first raised it with your employer. The time period for telling your employer about your grievance is called the employee notification period, which is usually 90 days, but can be 12 months for some types of grievances, such as those related to section 103(1)(d).

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View the original legislation for this page at https://legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1986/0120/latest/link.aspx?id=DLM60354.

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Part 9Personal grievances, disputes, and enforcement
Personal grievances

114Raising personal grievance

  1. An employee who wishes to raise a personal grievance must, subject to subsections (3) and (4), raise the grievance with their employer within the applicable employee notification period unless the employer consents to the personal grievance being raised after the expiration of that period.

  2. For the purposes of subsection (1), a grievance is raised with an employer as soon as the employee has made, or has taken reasonable steps to make, the employer or a representative of the employer aware that the employee alleges a personal grievance that the employee wants the employer to address.

  3. Where the employer does not consent to the personal grievance being raised after the expiration of the employee notification period, the employee may apply to the Authority for leave to raise the personal grievance after the expiration of that period.

  4. On an application under subsection (3), the Authority, after giving the employer an opportunity to be heard, may grant leave accordingly, subject to such conditions (if any) as it thinks fit, if the Authority—

  5. is satisfied that the delay in raising the personal grievance was occasioned by exceptional circumstances (which may include any 1 or more of the circumstances set out in section 115); and
    1. considers it just to do so.

      1. In any case where the Authority grants leave under subsection (4), the Authority must direct the employer and employee to use mediation to seek to mutually resolve the grievance.

      2. No action may be commenced in the Authority or the court in relation to a personal grievance more than 3 years after the date on which the personal grievance was raised in accordance with this section.

      3. In this section, employee notification period means,—

      4. in respect of a personal grievance under section 103(1)(d), the period of 12 months beginning with the date on which the action alleged to amount to the personal grievance occurred or came to the notice of the employee, whichever is later:
        1. in respect of any other personal grievance, the period of 90 days beginning with the date on which the action alleged to amount to a personal grievance occurred or came to the notice of the employee, whichever is later.

          Compare
          • 1991 No 22 s 33
          Notes
          • Section 114(1): replaced, on , by section 6(1) of the Employment Relations (Extended Time for Personal Grievance for Sexual Harassment) Amendment Act 2023 (2023 No 28).
          • Section 114(3): amended, on , by section 6(2) of the Employment Relations (Extended Time for Personal Grievance for Sexual Harassment) Amendment Act 2023 (2023 No 28).
          • Section 114(7): inserted, on , by section 6(3) of the Employment Relations (Extended Time for Personal Grievance for Sexual Harassment) Amendment Act 2023 (2023 No 28).