Contract hours - Broken the law?

Naturlee

All sorted now.

Naturlee

All sorted now.

Savvy_Sue

If you signed and kept a copy of your original contract, you'll be able to show what they've done.

How many hours are you now working?

Naturlee

All sorted now.

Savvy_Sue

So what does this mean?

Naturlee wrote: »

But my pay slip is the amount of money as if i was on an 8 hour contract.

You're working 4 hours and they are paying you for 8?

Naturlee

All sorted now.

zzzLazyDaisy

If they unilaterally reduce your hours to 4, when you have a contract that says you are employed to work 8 hours, that is a breach of contract.

What you need to do is speak to your manager, or HR and point out what has happened. Hopefully someone will realise and correct it. If not, then you need to invoke the company's grievance procedure and make a formal complaint.

Ultimately, though, you can't force them to put you back on 8 hours. If you continue to work under the new contract (ie 4 hours) you will be deemed by your conduct to have accepted the new terms.

You can't make a claim to an employment tribunal for breach of contract unless your employment has ended. So, if having raised the grievance and got nowhere, and you wish to complain to an employment tribunal, you would have to resign. If you have more that 12 months continuous service you could make a claim for constructive dismissal, breach of contract, and unlawful deduction from wages.

PLEASE NOTE: I am not advising you to do this as by far the majority of CD claims fail, and on top of that you would have lost your job and the possibility of further overtime once things pick up.

But those are your choices.

patman99

The 4 hour contract has no legal being as it was altered after you signed-it, and if I remember my contract law from my A-level studies, Once signed, a contract can not be altered or amended unless by Act of Parliament. Any alteration forms a new contract which comes into force when either you sign it or in the case of employment contracts, 3 months after the change.

Mind you, if you get a higher pay-rate for hours worked above those contracted, then you will only have to work half as many hours before the higher rate kicks-in.

zzzLazyDaisy

patman99 wrote: »

Any alteration forms a new contract which comes into force when either you sign it or in the case of employment contracts, 3 months after the change.

In the case of an employment contract, all the employer has to do is give notice of the change as required by the contract. For someone with short service this could be as little as a week. If the employee continues to work under the new contract s/he is deemed to have accepted it by their conduct (whether or not proper notice was given).

patman99

A person has to work for a minimum of 12 weeks before the new contract is accepted as binding. I know this because in my last place of work we had 3 major amendments to the C of E in the 16 years I was there. A few of us objected to the last set of changes, so being in a union, I gave them a ring and they told me that until 12 weeks passed from the date of the first issue of the new contract to an employee who signed-it, we were under our previous C of E. After the 12 week period it is deemed that everybody has accepted the new C of E by custom and practice.
This was then confirmed by a guy on our night shift who's BiL was an Employment Law Solicitor.

patman99

Anyway, I think we are all agreed that the answer to the OP's question is 'No', it is not illegal.


Could well be his employer is cutting staff and by halving the hours, hopes the required number of people leave, thus saving the firm any redundancy pay-outs.