{"id":453089,"date":"2026-04-25T10:53:12","date_gmt":"2026-04-25T10:53:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/453089\/"},"modified":"2026-04-25T10:53:12","modified_gmt":"2026-04-25T10:53:12","slug":"worker-investigated-for-excessive-fuel-card-use-said-he-left-jeep-running-all-weekend-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/453089\/","title":{"rendered":"Worker investigated for \u2018excessive fuel-card use\u2019 said he left jeep running \u2018all weekend\u2019 \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

An explosives and blasting firm\u2019s engineer who was investigated for \u201cexcessive use\u201d of a company fuel card told his bosses he left his work jeep running all weekend, a tribunal has heard. <\/p>\n

Thomas Giles failed in a case at the Workplace Relations Commission<\/a> (WRC) challenging his sacking from Kemek Ltd for gross misconduct. <\/p>\n

The company, which traded for 40 years as Irish Industrial Explosives before a 2023 corporate rebrand, said it had \u201cno alternative\u201d except to sack Giles. <\/p>\n

Giles was a technical service engineer on the road for the Enfield, Co Meath<\/a>, firm, which specialises in the deployment of explosives in the quarrying and construction sectors. <\/p>\n

He had been issued with a leased Toyota<\/a> Land Cruiser as a company vehicle \u2013 along with a fuel card \u2013 but began to face questions on fuel usage starting in 2022. <\/p>\n

Giles was confronted with the figures on his fuel usage during investigation meetings in March 2024 setting out that he was using more twice as much fuel as his colleagues, said Zoe O\u2019Sullivan, for the company. <\/p>\n

Giles was also shown an email from Circle K<\/a> stating that the service station group had CCTV footage showing \u201cvehicles other than the company vehicle\u201d and \u201ccanisters\u201d being filled by Giles, O\u2019Sullivan told the WRC hearing. <\/p>\n

At the meeting Giles replied that he was \u201cunhappy\u201d with his employer and said he was \u201crunning his vehicle all weekend\u201d. <\/p>\n

The human resources manager chairing the meeting looked for clarity on what he meant by \u201call weekend\u201d and queried whether he was \u201cturning it off at night and restarting it in the morning\u201d, it was submitted. <\/p>\n

Giles replied he \u201cran it the entire time\u201d, the tribunal was told. <\/p>\n

He then told the investigation meeting he had also fuelled up other vehicles when his company car was out of action, citing \u201cbattery issues\u201d. <\/p>\n

In his evidence to the WRC, Giles told the tribunal the \u201ccrux\u201d of the matter was that after coming home one night after \u201canother 60-hour week\u201d he found that his Toyota Land Cruiser had a flat battery. <\/p>\n

He jump-started the vehicle and \u201clet it run to charge up the battery\u201d, he said in his evidence to the WRC. <\/p>\n

Then he then thought: \u201cThey don\u2019t care about how many hours I\u2019m doing. Why should I care about how much fuel is used?\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

He then \u201cwalked away and just left the jeep running\u201d, he told the WRC hearing. <\/p>\n

He said he had worked \u201cunremunerated overtime\u201d worth \u20ac200,000 at Kemek. <\/p>\n

A separate disciplinary panel decided Giles\u2019 actions amounted to gross misconduct for abuse of a company vehicle, excessive use of the fuel card and excessive fuel consumption. <\/p>\n

He was dismissed on April 5th, 2024, after five years in the job. <\/p>\n

Giles told the WRC he found it hard to find work after being dismissed, with prospective employers going \u201ccold\u201d after \u201csuccessful initial contact and interviews\u201d. <\/p>\n

He claimed he was being \u201cblacklisted\u201d and said he fell into \u201csignificant debt\u201d while unemployed. He told the WRC he estimated he would be at a loss of \u20ac500,000 over the course of his career. <\/p>\n

Giles, who represented himself, said in a legal submission: \u201cThere are many, many excellent people at Kemek\/Irish Industrial Explosives, but sometimes there are entrenched opinions and unsafe working practices and the only way to solve this is to put something on the record like this today or levy the maximum fine.\u201d<\/p>\n

Denying his complaint under the Unfair Dismissals Act 1977, O\u2019Sullivan said Giles was dismissed after a \u201cthorough process\u201d and was afforded \u201cmaximum fairness\u201d. <\/p>\n

WRC adjudication officer Gaye Cunningham ruled Giles\u2019 complaint \u201cnot well founded\u201d and upheld his dismissal. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"An explosives and blasting firm\u2019s engineer who was investigated for \u201cexcessive use\u201d of a company fuel card told…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":453090,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[73],"tags":[79,37775,18,19,17,1873,72132,80,81],"class_list":["post-453089","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-business","tag-circle-k","tag-eire","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-meath","tag-toyota","tag-work","tag-workplace-relations-commission"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/116464976226759073","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/453089","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=453089"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/453089\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/453090"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=453089"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=453089"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=453089"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}