Salon ordered to pay $230k to seven former employees
The owner of a central Wellington beauty salon has been ordered to pay more than $230,000 to seven women, brought over to work for her from Vietnam.
Many of the women had met Ngoc Tuyet Uyen Huynh (known as Amy) in Vietnam and attended training days in Ho Chi Minh City, run by Huynh’s niece, before being offered jobs as nail technicians at Amy’s Hair and Nail Design on Ghuznee St.
But the reality was very different on arrival, decisions by the Employment Relations Authority (ERA) found.
ERA member Claire English treated each case separately. Across seven decisions, she ordered Huynh to pay the women between $27,000 and $37,000 each in compensation for lost wages, compensation for hurt and humiliation, and a penalty for breaching the employment agreement.
It amounted to $230,929.60 in total.
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