Ah, Pizza Hut. You impressed us all when you sent your competitors heart shaped pizza’s with cheesy puns for Valentine’s day. I was so impressed that I even made my first order in years and was seriously considering my stance on Domino’s being the best ‘fast food’ pizza around. But then my pizza took an hour to come and when it did you forgot my mushroom soup and all the reasons I stopped ordering from you guys came flooding back.

Now that I’ve got that personal anecdote out of the way, Pizza Hut has found itself in hot water after its director was found guilty of negligence in workplace safety, with the company being fined RM25,000 at the Sessions Court yesterday.

Representing Pizza Hut was Lee Weng Hua, who entered a guilty plea under section 15 (1) of the Occupational Safety and Health Act 1994. Under this offence, guilty parties can be fined not more than RM50,000, a jail sentence of not more than two years, or both.

RM25,000 may sound like a lot, but once you hear what happened, you may find yourself questioning if Pizza Hut got off easy. Muhammad Hafizzudin Redzuan, who worked as a rider for the Batu Gajah branch was hit by an electric shock while helping to clean the ice maker machine back in October 2019 in an incident that led to him suffering brain damage.

The court concluded that the company failed to ensure a safe working environment, which led to the accident. In spite of the prosecuting officer requesting for the maximum punishment under the law, judge Norashima Khalid fined the restaurant RM25,000, in default six months’ jail. She also ordered the restaurant to pay RM15,000 as compensation to Muhammad Hafizzudin’s family.

I can’t help but to think that the Hut got off easy here. An RM25,000 fine and RM15,000 in compensation is nothing to the company, but that’s not even the main issue here. RM15,000 will barely be enough to cover the cost of taking care of someone with a permanent disability. All that money to spend on marketing for Valentine’s day but when it comes to doing what’s right, I guess the bare minimum will do. I’m not sure if the company has taken the initiative to offer financial support to the family, but i’m really hoping it has.