Jämsänkosi care home workers face pay cuts after salary error

Fourteen employees at the Lammenranta care home in Jämsänkoski will see their monthly pay fall by 150 to 175 euros from September after a payroll classification error, Yle reported.

The Central Finland Wellbeing Services County had incorrectly registered the care home as a specialised dementia unit, which qualified its staff for higher pay. The employees had received the higher salaries for about 18 months.

Marja Laurila, service manager for older people’s home and housing services, said the change was not a pay cut but a correction of an error in the assessment of the work’s demands.

“Lammenranta care home was incorrectly reported as a dementia unit, which has been the basis for the higher pay,” Laurila said.

Lammenranta is known as a former dementia home, but residents are now referred there on the same basis as to other housing service units. A separate specialised dementia unit operates in Kauramäki, Jyväskylä, where staffing levels and expertise have been increased to meet the unit’s needs.

The wellbeing services county will not seek repayment of the salaries paid in error. Laurila said the employees had been very upset, but that reclaiming the money was not necessary.

Trade union to investigate

Tehy, a trade union for healthcare professionals, plans to investigate whether the case was correctly treated as a payroll error, said Jussi Virta, the union’s representative at the wellbeing services county.

“There have been other cases in Finland where an employee has been placed in the wrong pay group,” Virta said. “As a union, we will check whether this was handled correctly. The matter is still unfinished on our part.”

Lammenranta currently employs two registered nurses and 12 practical nurses. Many of its residents have memory disorders.

Other pay changes possible

The salaries at Lammenranta were reviewed as part of a major pay structure reform in the social and healthcare sector, which will take effect in October.

The reform is intended to make pay more transparent by basing it on the skills and responsibilities required for each job. Workers from other units contacted the wellbeing services county after noticing that Lammenranta employees had higher salaries, which are publicly available within the organisation.

Laurila said salaries at other units could also be reviewed. “The work on the pay structure is still under way, so I cannot promise that there will not be more surprises,” she said.