Labour abuse and wage theft at Ítalía restaurant.

Long standing breaches of workers’ rights at restaurants operated by Elvar Ingimarsson

If you buy food and services at Ítalía or Geitin, you are financing wage theft, labor abuses, and tax fraud.

Updated October 14, 2024.

Ítalgest, the management company of Ítalía restaurant, was declared bankrupt last October 9. A number of the restaurant’s former employees, members of Efling Union, still had unpaid wages, in addition to the fact that other fees had not been paid in various cases. These include membership fees and premiums.

The number of employees who have not been paid for their work at Ítlaía restaurant is increasing even further. Efling will now, as before, provide all the help possible to its members who have worked in Elvars Ingimarsson’s restaurants.

In a report on Vísir.is last October 12, Elvar Ingimarsson, the owner of Ítalgest ehf, was quoted as saying that it was obvious that the actions of Efling Union had caused the bankruptcy.

This is wrong.

Efling union’s actions regarding wage theft and rights violations at Elvars Ingimarsson’s restaurants began on September 12. However, a demand for the bankruptcy of the company Ítalgest was submitted on September 5, a week before Efling’s protests began. It is therefore clear that the restaurant’s operation had long since reached a complete impasse before Efling Union took action to demand justice for its members.

The advertisement about the bankruptcy in Lögbirtingablaðið does not state who the petitioner is, but it is known that companies owned by Elvars Ingimarsson, including Ítalgest ehf., are in significant arrears with the public sector, amounting to tens of millions. Also, his partner’s arrears with Gildi Pension Fund amount to more than ten million ISK.

Efling Union will continue to monitor the course of events regarding Elvars Ingimarsson’s business and his actions against his employees.

Information about violations in Elvars Ingimarsson’s restaurants

The board of Efling Union and workers who have suffered abuse and violations of their rights wish to bring this information to your attention as a potential customer. Please think twice before stepping in.

Because of multiple, serious, and long-standing breaches of workers’ rights at restaurants operated by Mr. Elvar Ingimarsson, the board of Efling Union has decided in coordination with workers to raise public awareness about the practices at these restaurants.
The restaurants in question have been run at several locations under different names in recent years, mostly in the Reykjavík city Centre. The ones that are currently in operation are Ítalía at Frakkastígur and Geitin in Garðabær suburb. These restaurants are run and/or owned by Mr. Elvar Ingimarsson and his business partner Mr. Björgvin Narfi Ásgeirsson.
In multiple confirmed cases, workers have not been paid their salaries when due at the end of the month. Instead, payment has been delayed for days, weeks, months, and in some cases years. This is a violation of Icelandic law and causes grave financial and personal difficulties for workers.
Efling Union has multiple open cases against Mr. Ingimarsson’s companies, out of which 7 have been sent for collection to an external law firm. Examples of violations are late payment of wages, paying wages under the legal minimum, neglecting to pay wages during termination period, neglecting to pay overtime wages, and neglecting to make obligatory payments to unions and union funds.
In many cases, workers have faced difficulties in defending their rights due to the absence of documentation that employers are obligated to provide, such as hiring contracts and time slips. Irregularities of this kind, which are systematically used at these restaurants, make it harder for workers to pursue corrections of wrongly paid salaries.
Instead of paying union dues to Efling, which is the union of restaurant workers in the capital region, these restaurants have instead issued fraudulent pay slips indicating payment of union dues to another union (FLM). FLM, which does not have any contracts for restaurant work, has confirmed with Efling that they have not received union dues for the workers in question. Therefore, Mr. Ingimarsson has pocketed the union dues of workers, which is an act of theft.
The total number of individuals who have had open cases with Efling due to various kinds of labor malpractice at these restaurants is 38. All have similar stories to tell.
Elvar Ingimarsson has a history of tax evasion and underpayment of public fees. He is registered in “serious arrears” with the Tax Office. His debts to the public sector, collected by the District Commissioner Office in the capital area, total more than 17 million ISK.
On September 12, Efling members organized a demonstration outside Ítalía restaurant, where flyers were handed out to those passing by and the actions of Mr. Elvars Ingimarsson were protested loudly.”

All of the above has been verified by Efling Union on the basis of publicly available information, testimonies from workers, and from documents issued by Mr. Ingimarsson’s restaurants themselves.

Efling Union

Resolution of the Delegate Council of Efling

At a meeting of the Delegate Council of Efling on September 12 2024 a resolution against labor abuses and wage theft at the restaurant Ítalía was approved. After the meeting a solidarity action at the restaurant Ítalía is also undertaken. The full text of the resolution of the delegate council can be found here.

Testimonies by members of Efling Union regarding rights violations in restaurants owned or operated by Elvars Ingimarsson

Efling member Vitalii Shybka’s testimony:

“I was hired at the Ítalía restaurant in December 2023. I was very happy to have gotten the job, but that happiness quickly vaporized. After working there for a month, I got no salary. I was forced to get loans from friends to pay rent and buy food.

This is how it went every month: the employer didn’t pay salaries and I was forced to get loans. When I spoke to the head of operations in Italy, he referred me to Elvar [Ingimarsson], who referred to the accountant, who in turn referred to Elvar.

The aforementioned Elvar often said when I talked to him that I should try to take on his job, there was simply no money to pay my salary.

This all had a very bad effect on my life. As a result of these financial problems, my relationship with my girlfriend became strained, which eventually led to the end of the relationship. I couldn’t find another job for quite some time because I became depressed and had to seek professional help. I left my job on May 26 and still haven’t been paid in full.”

Vitalii is a 24-year-old member of Efling Union, from Ukraine.

Efling member Erik Krištovčo’s testimony:

“I was offered a job in 2023 as a shift manager at the Antico restaurant, but I had previously worked there as a side job with another job. I negotiated wages and working hours, but never received an employment contract, despite following up on it many times. However, I was not too worried because wages were paid regularly, but never on the day of payment, but always a little later. Of course, it was very inconvenient because it made it difficult for me to pay rent.

After some time, however, it became clear that the taxes that had been deducted from me had not been paid to the Tax Office. Also, my personal tax discount had been overused since I was working extra at Antico, despite my making it clear that it should not be used there at all.

This caused me a lot of worry and anger, as I suddenly owed the Tax Office about 550 thousand ISK. Because I was starting my studies, I quit my job last January 27th, in debt and without having been paid for my work for the last month.

I went to Elvar [Ingimarsson] many times and demanded that wages be paid. The answer was usually that it would be done the next day. Now, 8 months later, nothing has happened in those matters, and in a text message from Elvar, he confirmed to me that he does not intend to pay me the salary I owe, neither now nor later.”

Erik is a 26-year-old Eflinger member from Slovakia.

A testimony by an Efling member, who chooses to remain anonymous:

“I worked for a month and a half as a waiter at Ítalía restaurant last spring. However, I was not paid my salary for April and after waiting until May 5th for salary payments, I decided to quit my job there. I did that also after hearing the stories of other employees who stated that they had not been paid in part or in whole, in some cases for months. The unpaid wages of some of them, I was told, were up to one million ISK.

To this day, I still have not been paid in full the wages I am entitled to. About 40 percent are missing.”

An Efling member in his thirties from an EEA country.

A testimony by an Efling member, who chooses to remain anonymous:

“I worked at the restaurant Ítalía in July and August 2023. I was paid very low overtime wages and I was not paid overtime wages when I worked on red days but only daily wages. I’ve never had a breakdown of my hours but I worked a lot of overtime, over 50 hours in July. I was also charged a membership fee for Efling Union, which was never paid to the union.

Finally, it’s worth mentioning that the boss of Ítalía, who was also the co-owner of the company as I was told, was constantly inviting me out for a drink, which made me very uncomfortable, given that he was both my boss and much older than me .”

An Efling member in his thirties from an EEA country.

A testimony by an Efling member, who chooses to remain anonymous:

“I saw an advertisement on Alfreð where it said that they were looking for people for extra work, so I decided to try it and went to Ítalía. There I was told that they wanted me to do a trial shift, a maximum of four hours, and in return I would receive a gift card in the amount of 10 thousand ISK. I said that I don’t work for free, but I would like to try for the job and it was accepted. I worked there for three hours last March 23, and after that the shift manager said he was happy with me and I got the job.

After that, I repeatedly tried to contact the management to inquire further about terms and conditions, but to no avail. I was told that the person in charge of recruitment had no working phone number!

My opinion is that this was an organized fraud. I heard that the restaurant was getting a large number of people in for trial shifts, under the premises that they would be rewarded with a gift card. The gift card also turned out was not worth the mentioned 10 thousand ISK, but only 5 thousand. I did not accept it and demanded to be paid for my work. I have not received that despite repeated attempts.”

An Efling member in his forties from an EEA country.

A testimony by an Efling member, who chooses to remain anonymous:

“I worked at the restaurant Il Antico from February to May of 2023. During that time, the salary payments were so often and repeatedly delayed that my wife and I were forced to move out of the rented apartment we were living in and into a rented room because we couldn’t pay the rent on time. I was not paid until long after I had been laid off and this has caused a lot of problems in my life.

In December of last year, the operations manager of Antico contacted me and offered me the job of assistant chef at the restaurant Ítalía. He assured me that there would be no problem with payment of salary this time. But unfortunately history repeated itself. Salary payments were repeatedly delayed and every time I asked Elvar [Ingimarsson] about when I would receive my salary, the answer was either tomorrow (which never happened) or that he had no funds to put into salary payments and I might just have to take over his job.

I worked at Ítalía restaurant until last June 26. So far, I have not been paid in full for the month of May and I have not received any salary for June.”

An Efling member in his forties from Ukraine.