Employer asking for money to even up till at end of day - is this legal?

declanmcc

Hi,

My wife has recently started work with a high street name and after working with various other high street names has found the following approach very strange.

In a now daily occurence, the money in the till at the end of the day is not matching what SHOULD be there according to till receipts etc. The manager has asked the employees who have worked there during the day to make up the difference out of their own pockets. This can range between a couple of quid to maybe even 20 quid. A number of things could be happening. There could be someone incompetent at the till - someone who can't count- or the till float could even be counted incorrectly at the start of the day. However is this approach of asking staff to even up the till from their own pockets legal??

Thanks.

tanith

I have no idea wether its legal or not ( I suspect not) but I know where I would be telling the employer to go if he asked me for money to make up the till.....:eek: :rotfl:

hjb123

Hi,

There was another thread on this subject recently HERE

If there is more than one person that uses the till then it really is not fair. Check what it written in the contract - is it in this that you have seen she has to make the money up? I too wouldnt be happy at making the money up - they should provide better training and/or do random till checks on all the staff to see who needs more training

It may be worth getting in touch with ACAS or the CAB to see what they can advise you.

kelloggs36

It sounds a bit dodgy to me. The employer should be thoroughly checking to see if there is a pattern i.e. if the shortfall is from the same till, same person etc, as there is a chance that somebody is not being honest as well as the other possibilities that you mentioned. Surely not all the tills are short at the end of each day? If it is just one, then the person on that till needs to be questioned to see if they can offer any explaination.

ariba10

If there is more money than there should be in the till, do the staff get to keep it?

reehsetin

when we cash up at work its usually a couple of pennies out we have a little float from when its up to put in or if theres nothing there we usually clam together to make it easy but £20 thats stupid they can not make staff do that i would refuse! it should be down to the employer to investigate the loss and find out whos responsible and deal with it!
there should be a system in place for when the till is short ie in a big organisation reporting a discrepency and figuring it out

declanmcc

Thanks for the replies guys.

She hasn't actually signed a contract as yet and is unaware of the terms and conditions of her contract - however - the more I think about it - the more I think that if a proper procedure was in place - then any deductions would be from your salary and not from your pocket at the end of the day. It's probably a unwritten rule by the manager for that store and that store only. This is a high street chain of stores and it would be interesting to know if this is a consistent procedure across all their stores.

She's in work tomorrow and is going to ask to see the terms and conditions of her contract. She'll have more of an idea of company procedure then.

jayne26

ask for it in writting that they are reqesting you to put in your own money in . and then refuse. it could just be a cheeky boss trying it on and head office may not know about it ,

Optimist

The Employment Rights Act 1996 gives retail workers special protection in that the employer can deduct no more than 10% of any gross wages in respect of cash/stock shortages. However they can deduct 10% from the workers gross wage in installments until said shortfall is made up.

There are certain conditions before doing this one of which is that they must let the worker know in writing the full amount he/she owes and they must make a written demand for payment on one of the paydays.

zorber

Yes but if the till is shared and not counted in between then they cannot pinpoint one person as who owns the money.

What high street shop is this ??

secondly if they are big enough call up head office speak with the personel department and clarify what the situation is.
As someone else has pointed out may just be the store manager making a policy he isnt supposed too.

CFC

If I were you, I'd see if someone who has been there longer can raise the question. If you've not been there five minutes and raise a stink, it might make life difficult.