She was congratulated for her visa one week, then told not to come back the next
A migrant caregiver asked her Auckland employer to honour the pay rate written into her own signed contract. She was fired by WeChat message the same day.
The Employment Relations Authority has ordered New Windsor 2017 Limited, trading as New Windsor Care, to pay more than $83,000 after finding the residential aged care operator unjustifiably dismissed and disadvantaged the worker - denying her agreed wages, withholding leave entitlements, and ending her employment without process.
The determination, issued October 6, 2026, laid bare a pattern of underpayment at the Auckland care home and an employer that largely refused to front up when it mattered.
From trial shifts to cash in hand
The worker started at the home for older Chinese residents in May 2023, beginning with two half-day trial shifts paid at around $100 in cash. Her first written employment agreement, signed weeks later, put her rate at $22.70 an hour for a minimum of 30 hours a week.
That did not last long. By December 2023, she had signed a second contract listing her as a health care assistant on $29.66 an hour for a minimum 40 hours a week. The new terms were drawn up to support her application for an Accredited Employer Work Visa, which required a written agreement specifying an hourly rate and minimum hours.
But the pay never followed the paperwork. From around November 2023, the worker began receiving cash payments at just $20 an hour - below either agreed rate - and her hours dropped to between 20 and 30 a week. She received no payslips during this period.
The volunteer agreement
Then there was the volunteer agreement. The employer claimed the worker signed a volunteer agreement in late December 2023, agreeing to work unpaid on flexible days. It said the worker later advised she could not survive without wages, and that out of "compassion," the employer "had no choice but to start paying her a standard wage according to regulations."
The worker acknowledged her signature appeared on the document but said she did not understand its contents and did not remember signing it. The handwriting, she said, was not hers.
A visa approved, a job lost
In July 2024, the worker's visa was approved for four years. Her manager congratulated her by WeChat and suggested a celebratory meal.
The celebration was short-lived.
On August 4, 2024, the worker asked about aligning her wages with the terms of her contract. That same day, the manager told her the employer could not pay $29.66 an hour or provide 40 hours a week. The worker was notified by WeChat that she was no longer required.
The employer's position was blunt. It questioned how a small aged care facility could possibly offer those terms and claimed the pay rate and hours in the agreement had been filled in by the worker and her immigration adviser without its consent. The Authority, however, had before it the employer's own signed agreements.
An employer that did not show up
The employer's engagement with the Authority was limited. Its manager joined the first hearing by audio-visual link after failing to attend in person, citing work commitments. Shortly after questioning began, she said she was unwell and needed a break. She did not return.
A medical certificate followed - but it was a generic document stating unfitness for "school/daycare." When a new hearing date was set after the certificate's stated period, the manager claimed to still be unwell but provided no further medical evidence. She did not attend the reconvened hearing on September 4, 2026, and the matter proceeded without her.
The employer had also refused to engage with mediation over the preceding 10 months, despite repeated attempts by the worker through MBIE Mediation Services.
What it cost
Without adequate wage and leave records from the employer, the Authority accepted the worker's own calculations. Wage arrears came to $26,291.86. Annual holiday pay of $3,677.84 was owed - the Authority found that a payment recorded as holiday pay in January 2024 was actually wages for work done during that period. Sick leave pay of $2,001.05 and public holiday pay of $1,668.38 were also awarded.
The Authority found the dismissal was unjustified. The employer had simply sent the worker away - no investigation, no concerns raised, no chance to respond, no process to speak of.
The worker also established that the employer had unjustifiably disadvantaged her by reducing her hours and wages below the agreed terms.
Not the first time
This was not the employer's first time before the Authority. The determination noted that New Windsor 2017 Limited had been hit with a $3,000 penalty in a separate, recent case involving failures to pay another employee for hours worked and holiday pay. The employer did not pay those awards either, prompting a compliance order earlier this year.
This time, the penalty was $8,000 - half to the worker, half to the Crown. The Authority found the breaches were intentional and the employer's culpability high.
The human cost
The worker was awarded $25,000 for humiliation, loss of dignity, and injury to feelings, and $21,355.20 in lost wages reflecting more than 18 weeks without income after her dismissal.
The Authority accepted her evidence of significant financial loss and psychological harm. She had come to New Zealand from China with her three children as dependents. After her dismissal, she looked for caregiving work at multiple rest homes and attended interviews but could not find a position. The Authority heard evidence that the manager's comments about contacting Immigration New Zealand regarding the worker's visa caused further distress.
In total, New Windsor 2017 Limited was ordered to pay $83,994.33 to the worker, plus $4,000 to the Crown, within 28 days.
For HR teams in aged care - and any sector employing workers on employer-sponsored visas - the case is a straightforward lesson: the terms you sign are the terms you owe. An employer that stops engaging will eventually have to answer to the Authority, on the Authority's terms.
The determination was issued by the Employment Relations Authority on October 6, 2026. No costs were sought.
