Over paid salary

Slimming-world

Hi

I am asking this on behalf of my friend - its a bit long (sorry:o)

In 2008 she took a promotion and with this an increase in salary, this was marked in her wage slip (or so she thought) as 'extra duties', in 2010 she felt she couldn't cope with the job (see below for the reason why) so went back down to her original job which she has been doing since taking a reduction in salary.

Last pay day she noticed that her salary was less than usual so she contacted the payroll department and they told her that she was now on the correct salary and someone was going to get in touch with her at some point regarding paying back the over payment (surly they should of contacted her before her salary hit her bank account to let her know she would be receiving less per month from how on??)

Any way, she had a meeting with the HR department and they have told her that she has been over paid by £7,000 since 2008 as they had made a mistake by paying her 'Extra Duties' plus an increase for her new job in her salary and she will need to pay this back at £150 per month until it is repaid.

So this means that on top of losing the £200 per month over payment she has also got to find £150, she simply can not afford this.

Her questions are:

Can they make her pay this back? even tho this is not a mistake she would of be able to detect ?
If yes can they dictate how much?

The other problem is that since 2008 (maybe before, I am not 100% when it started) she has been on an IVA - the amount she paid would of been based on her salary - unfortunately this failed and last year she had to go bankrupt, again the amount she is paying each month is based on her salary.

Thank you in advance to anyone who can spare the time to reply
And hopefully I have explained the problem in a way that you can understand

SarEl

If she has has been overpaid in error - even if she did not know about it - then she must pay it back, yes. But first she should check that what they are saying is true - ask for a breakdown abd explanation. Debts owed can be reclaimed for six years so they are within time to do it.

If this is correct, then she should check her written statement of main particulars - there is usually a term in there that permits deductions for payroll errors, but even if there isn't, the law permits recovery of such errors from payroll. So yes, again - they are permitted to do this. It's a bit high handed to do it without notice and without discussing the amounts with her - but not per se unlawful.

The situation of her personal circumstances - well if she has the legal ability to dispute the deductions, but owes money, then they can simply take it to court for repayment, which I am not convinced will improve matters for her anyway. If they did this then she would end up paying more because court charges would be added, and whilst the payments may reduce (and that is only a may) it still has to be paid back. I don't know much about bankruptcy but surely there must be some way of renegotiating payments if your pay is reduced or stops - it can't be that uncommon an occurence?

scottishgirl87

Yes they can definitely make her pay it back.

Has she tried speaking to the company? Something similar happened to a friend of mine and the company originally wanted the full amount back in one. My friend spoke to them and between them they came to an arrangement of him paying it back monthly at an amount he was happy with.

Slimming-world

Thank you for speedy your reply!

I think the main problem she is going to have is the amount she has to pay towards her bankruptcy each month is far less than the over payment of £200 and then with her having to pay back the £150 a month even if she able to get her bankruptcy payment reduced or at best stopped all together, this will leave her
with less than £800 per month to pay all her bills etc

Slimming-world

scottishgirl87 wrote: »

Yes they can definitely make her pay it back.

Has she tried speaking to the company? Something similar happened to a friend of mine and the company originally wanted the full amount back in one. My friend spoke to them and between them they came to an arrangement of him paying it back monthly at an amount he was happy with.

Thank you for your reply :A

She finds it difficult to speak to someone on the phone or face to face so I was thinking maybe I could help her draft a letter to the HR dept so she can outline her financial position and then hopefully they will be able to see that she cant afford the £150 per month and see if they can come to an agreement.

I seems really unfair that they can make a mistake like this for so long and then say 'give us it back, at this much a month'

The company she works for are aware of her bankruptcy as she had to inform them when it was going through

Thanks again :A

scottishgirl87

Slimming-world wrote: »

Thank you for your reply :A

She finds it difficult to speak to someone on the phone or face to face so I was thinking maybe I could help her draft a letter to the HR dept so she can outline her financial position and then hopefully they will be able to see that she cant afford the £150 per month and see if they can come to an agreement.

I seems really unfair that they can make a mistake like this for so long and then say 'give us it back, at this much a month'

The company she works for are aware of her bankruptcy as she had to inform them when it was going through

Thanks again :A

A letter would probably be great, but make sure it's kept to the point and not focussing on laying blame, how angry she is, etc. Also she should probably work out how much she can really afford to pay back and include that in the letter, eg. "proposing to pay £X amount per month over a period of X amount of months/years".

Good Luck

Slimming-world

scottishgirl87 wrote: »

A letter would probably be great, but make sure it's kept to the point and not focussing on laying blame, how angry she is, etc. Also she should probably work out how much she can really afford to pay back and include that in the letter, eg. "proposing to pay £X amount per month over a period of X amount of months/years".

Good Luck

Thank you :A

Uncertain

SarEl wrote: »

I don't know much about bankruptcy but surely there must be some way of renegotiating payments if your pay is reduced or stops - it can't be that uncommon an occurence?

Likewise....

However I was wondering if there may be something here? This seems to put her employers in a different (and better) position compared with all her other creditors. Do they retain this right under these circumstances? Or should they be in the queue for so many pence in the pound along with the others?

SarEl

Uncertain wrote: »

Likewise....

However I was wondering if there may be something here? This seems to put her employers in a different (and better) position compared with all her other creditors. Do they retain this right under these circumstances? Or should they be in the queue for so many pence in the pound along with the others?

Couldn't say. But my best guess is that yes they do have more rights because they are not part of the bankruptcy order (so not one of the creditors), and I am wracking my brains trying to work out what legislation would enable the creditors (and it would have to be them) to force an employer to pay the full wage. And even if such exists - OP still owes (I assume) the money and provided they keep chasing her once every six years (or more) they will still get it, one way or another. Can someone declare double bankruptcy??? Although I suspect I see the OP's job disappearing rapidly if they did. TBH if negotiation doesn't work I think a specialist advisor in bankruptcy rather than employment is called for.

Slimming-world

Uncertain wrote: »

Likewise....

However I was wondering if there may be something here? This seems to put her employers in a different (and better) position compared with all her other creditors. Do they retain this right under these circumstances? Or should they be in the queue for so many pence in the pound along with the others?

Thank you for your reply :A

I was thinking that if they had noticed the mistake 12 months ago could the 'debt' of been added to the bankruptcy?

Uncertain

SarEl wrote: »

Couldn't say. But my best guess is that yes they do have more rights because they are not part of the bankruptcy order (so not one of the creditors), and I am wracking my brains trying to work out what legislation would enable the creditors (and it would have to be them) to force an employer to pay the full wage. And even if such exists - OP still owes (I assume) the money and provided they keep chasing her once every six years (or more) they will still get it, one way or another. Can someone declare double bankruptcy??? Although I suspect I see the OP's job disappearing rapidly if they did. TBH if negotiation doesn't work I think a specialist advisor in bankruptcy rather than employment is called for.

Yes.

However, surely the employer was a creditor at the time of the bankruptcy if they had been overpaying (even if they didn't then know it).

OK, they have unwittingly "leant" more money since.

I think I'm right in saying you have to make a claim to the receiver by a certain date (notice in newspaper) otherwise you lose your entitlement to anything?