Council overpays 1.2 million euro to firefighters

It has emerges that Donegal Council has paid €1.2 million to 159 members of the county’s fire service due to an administrative error.
Firefighters who are employed by the council, are normally paid about €8,000 on a quarterly basis but some workers received up to three times their normal salary when they checked their payslips last Friday.
It is understood at least one person was paid as much as €24,000, while payments of €16,000 each were also believed to have been made to members of the fire service for three months’ work.
In a statement, the council’s finance department said that an error occurred in the processing of payroll for staff remunerated on a quarterly basis during the week ending Friday, March 26th.
“A total of 159 such staff are included in this payroll run. This error is specific to this category of staff, and does not affect any other groups.”
The council says it is working in conjunction with software providers to rectify the error, and will then make the necessary corrections.