The law currently protects the rich and powerful e.g. Insurance
company like NTUC can simply refuse to settle claims by resorting
to technicality or ambiguities and there is nothing an injured or
insured person can do except to take out a law suit which may cause
him thousands of dollars which he often is unable to do thereby
being bullied by the powerful companies like NTUC Income.
Many employers too are taking advantage of the fact that the
letters of appointments are written in such a manner that there is
ambiguities in certain terms like salaries or entitlements or
bonuses.
Unless an employee happens to come under the rare collective
agreement cases or union cases normally an employee is at the mercy
of his or her employer who could write contract of appointment in
such a way as to avoid payments of benefits.
In normal contractual employment, an employer who deliberately
fails to pay on agreed salaries or bonus could simply refuse to pay
if he does not want to and could rely on contractual ambiguities if
any to get away with payments depending on how he writes his
contract.
This is the right of the employee in Singapore as the government
here does not look after the interest of their employees as well as
the employers who could then write his contract of employment with
ambiguities to avoid payments of agreed salaries or bonus.
Many employers in Singapore could simply avoid payments by making
payments subject to conditions which are unclear or ambiguous and
let the employee sue if he want to claim payments he is entitled
to.
To the government, the employers are more important than employees
so it does not provide any help to administer such contracts and
keep a neutral stand apart from providing minimum conditions like
medical leave, workman compensation for certain type of employees,
CPF or industrial arbitration cases for dealing with unions - not
protecting unions (but for protecting employers).
The whole employment contract is heavily stacked against the
employees.
If any employers want to penalize any employees like when the
employees resign the employers could just refuse to pay agreed
salaries or 13th month bonus and the employee will have to start
his own legal action to recover such non-payment.
I wrote to the Minister in charge to complain about my employer's
failure to pay agreed salaries and bonus in 2001 but received no
reply.
So after receiving no help I had to start my own legal action to
recover the salaries and bonus contracted to be paid. The lawyer
representing my ex-employer deliberately interpreted the contracted
payments against me even though on the written terms and fact the
agreed salaries and bonus were payable but I had to defend my
contractual rights all by myself without the help of any laws or
the minister.
So an employee should be expected to go through the legal process
to prove his case in a court of his rights like the Jonathan Lock
vs Harnam case over non-payment of insurance claim. A rich and
powerful employer could always refuse to pay the employee's agreed
salaries or bonus and let him start his own legal action to recover
the amounts incurring many thousands of dollars thereby deterring
the employees to sue.
Thus the law as it stands now is against the employees for if he is
bullied there is nothing he could do except to start an expensive
legal action with no guarantee of justice because an employer's
lawyer could almost fight on anything and give any clever excuses
given in the unclear contract to deny employee to right.
A clever employer only need to write the contracted payments as
subjected to certain condition which is hard to be determined so he
could deprive employees of salaries or bonus as agreed salaries and
bonus and the employer could not be penalised.
I won the case after two hearings in an out-of-court settlement but
got nothing of the salaries or bonus because what I won I used it
all to pay my legal fees.
This is how our world-class ministers are serving and looking after
their citizens who are being bullied left and right by the powerful
and rich errant employers.