Wages Dispute...Urgent help needed !

the_rottweiler

A few years ago I was working for a large retail group, a good few months later i was told that they had overpaid me by £800 and would take back £200 for next 4 months.
I pointed out that this was half my wage and I could not afford that and that I was not gonna run away with their money as 3 immediate family members worked at the same branch.
I offered £10 per week and this was accepted
They did not ask for a list of my spending though and I would not have given it unless they showed me the law

jobbingmusician

http://www.lemon-co.co.uk/article_overpayments.php

The most relevant part of this is:

'In order to show that an overpayment is not recoverable, then the employee must demonstrate three things. Firstly, it must be shown that the overpayment was the fault of the company and not the employee. Secondly, it must have been reasonable for the employee not to know that they were being overpaid. Thirdly, the employee must have acted to their disadvantage or the assumption that the payment of salary was correct (for example by spending the money!). The most common difficulty for employees is the second condition since it is often obvious when an overpayment has occurred. It is not acceptable for an employee to assume that they have received a substantial increase in pay unless there is some reason to believe that this is the case.'

Since your wife protested against the overpayment originally, and the employer insisted on making the payment, my belief is that she is likely to have a strong case for NOT repaying the money. I suggest the CAB as a first step.....

NTM_2

Thanks for that useful link jobbingmusician, I will seek further advice from the CAB, thank you to everyone for there input its much appreciated.

Fishcakes_2

Got to agree with jobbingmusician here. The fact the company insisted on you getting this money means you could reasonably expect it to be yours to spend as you wish. Do you have any evidence of your protestations about this overpayment? I think that would help your case. I would agree that a trip to the CAB is what to do. It doesn't seem right that you should pay for a mistake that you pointed out to them in the first place. If that money is spent then effectively you suddenly have a £3000 debt,,,,ouch!

NTM_2

I beleive my wife has copys of emails sent, basicly querying the extra money,and names and times of internal telephone conversations, of what use these might be is anybodys guess.