EMPLOYEES at a Glasgow-based data company have claimed they have not been fully paid for almost six months, despite promises from the company’s owner.
They work for Datalytics Technology, based at the Inovo Building in George Street, one of seven private limited companies run by James Sheffield, which develops statistical analysis software for the NHS and other sectors.
The staff and former employees did not want to be identified, but said that most of their colleagues had resigned and there were only a handful left in the office.
One of them – who we are calling Employee A – told The National: “There are a few people who are still there, but we are in dire financial straits.
“We can’t resign because if we do we won’t be able to claim any kind of benefits because we will be deemed to have made ourselves unemployed. If we stay we won’t get anything at all because there’s no work and no money.”
Employee B said they had been paid nothing in January and were only partially paid over September, October and November.
When contacted by The National, Sheffield admitted the failings but said he was committed to paying staff what they were owed.
However, employees say similar promises have so far not been met.
Employee B said: “We had nothing at all in January and this has been punctuated by a series of positive messages that quite specifically said ‘you’ll be paid tomorrow, next week etc’.
“None of these came to fruition and we’ve had a series of statements which attribute the blame to third parties, particularly Scottish Enterprise, who he claims have mishandled the grants.”
Employee C said: “He’s also blaming private equity investors and it has persisted to the point where we have taken it through the internal grievance process, to which his response was entirely unsatisfactory.”
Staff then took their claim to conciliation body ACAS, but blame Sheffield for a lack of progress. The issue will now be heard at an employment tribunal in April, which Sheffield has acknowledged.
Problems for the staff started last June, when salaries were a few days late. Then the same thing happened in July.
“Sheffield called us all to a meeting with [then director] Aidan Bennet and they told us unequivocally that they had received investment from Scottish Enterprise and another private investor, which meant there was enough money to keep us paid for two years,” said Employee A.
“In December he gathered the staff and told them payment was due the following day – the private equity investor had agreed to forward enough funds to satisfy the payroll. That didn’t happen.”
Datalytics CEO Sheffield, who boasts on his LinkedIn page that he and his co-founders “have led the company through product development, successful grant funding and investment funding”, lists himself as having a BSc (Hons) from King’s College at the University of London, and a Doctorate of (Reproductive) Medicine from the Royal Veterinary College, at the same university.
“We have had an amazing three years and the company is growing rapidly, thank [sic] to all those who have helped us achieve this remarkable success,” he wrote.
Sheffield admitted that his staff had not been fully paid since last year, because: “Basically we are in the process with an investor – Scottish Enterprise – to get more funds into the company.
“It’s not an ideal position for any company to be in, no.”
We asked how many people were left in his office, to which he replied: “I would have to go and check how many staff there are.
“The staff are obviously in a terrible position because of the lack of payment so I’d have to confirm that before I give you a number.”
Sheffield said the firm had received a £100,000 Scottish Enterprise (SE) SMART grant for research and development in 2015, but now he was looking for more from SE, because the firm had contracts lined up.
He added “We basically put a business plan into SE on the back of the initial grant that we had from SE and we are in the process of developing contracts and getting work for the area that we work in, which is data science. So, actually we have contracts under way, we are a small start-up company. As part of our business model grant funding is quite usual.”
Scottish Enterprise said they had received no application for further funding from Datalytics.
A spokesperson added: “There are no outstanding applications.”
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