Fined for illegal deductions

KUALA LUMPUR: Ice supplier Atlas Edible Ice Sdn Bhd was fined RM34,500 by the magistrate’s court yesterday after it was found guilty of 21 counts of breaching the Employment Act 1955 last year.

The company, represented by its director, Foo Fu Lum @ Foo Fu Lam, 59, pleaded guilty to failing to pay wages via bank accounts to three employees and making deductions from salaries without employees’ written applications to pay their personal loans and damages.

Foo nodded when the charges were read before magistrate Zuhair Rosli.

The company was fined RM21,000 for 12 counts of making illegal deductions from three of its Nepalese employees’ salaries to pay for damages and personal loans with the company.

The offence falls under Section 24 of the Employment Act 1955, punishable under Section 99A of the same act.

The company was also slapped with a RM13,500 fine for nine counts of failing to pay three of its employees’ “profit sharing” through their bank accounts in September, October and November last year.

The offence falls under Section 25 of the same act.

All of the offences were committed at the company’s premises at 155, Jalan Sri Ehsan, Taman Ehsan, Kepong, between Sept 30 and Dec 15 last year.

Earlier, Foo pleaded for a lenient sentence as the company was unaware that deducting employees’ salaries for loans was illegal.

“We would like to apologise as we did not know it was an illegal procedure to deduct their salaries without the permission of the human resources officer.

“We also did not know paying their salaries in cash was illegal… we did that following requests from our employees,” he said.