Portugal’s international emergency relief teams left waiting for pay

Teams already decorated by President Marcelo “not paid in full”

Several employees of Portugal’s medical emergency service, INEM, who have recently been on international missions in Turkey and Chile have not yet received all their overtime and per diem payments, with the missing amounts ranging between €500 and €800, according to their trade union.

Speaking to Lusa, president of the Union of Pre-Hospital Emergency Technicians (STEPH), Rui Lázaro, said that INEM has “failed to pay the working hours, as well as the per diem” of the four emergency technicians involved in the missions – adding that the same has happened with logistics technicians, psychologists, nurses and doctors.

The missions in Turkey – following a 7.8 earthquake – and Chile – in the aftermath of devastating wildfires – took place in February.

“On the one hand, the entire time they were engaged in the mission was not accounted for and, on the other, exceeding the already known limit for overtime work that is in force in the civil service- everything that exceeded sixty percent of basic pay INEM – does not pay,” explained Lázaro. “We are talking about an amount between five and eight hundred euros that these professionals have not received, nor will they, and which was actual working time on the mission they performed – where they were representing this country.”

For comparison, he stressed that technicians employed by National Emergency and Civil Protection Authority ANEPC, have all been paid in full, as an “international mission” instead of as regular overtime.

“Just last week they (the INEM employees) were honoured by the President of the Republic for the high commitment in the mission they made,” he said. “But when it comes to the hours they worked, INEM simply does not pay.”

Lázaro added that INEM’s human resources department claims  the limit imposed on the civil service “had been exceeded”.

But the explanation doesn’t wash, in that overtime limits have been exceeded in the past with the training of pre-hospital emergency technicians, and on those occasions, the amounts in question “were spread over the following months” so that technicians “ended up receiving” them.

This, he said, was a “solution that could happen in this case but, apparently, due to possible lack of will of the directive council, this has not been resolved.”

Questioned by Lusa, INEM responded that “the extra work of professionals who integrated the teams of the INEM sent to Chile and Turkey was paid according to what is legally defined,” adding that “values relating to the daily allowance are being determined.”

LUSA