Deductions from Wages

chrisbur

Attachment of earnings orders can be for several things, eg fines, debts, council tax, and also DWP has recently started using them to collect unpaid crisis loans, sometimes from years back. Whoever it comes from your payroll dept is obliged to advise you who you need to contact to find out details. Also worth asking to see the order as mistakes can happen might be for someone else working where you do with a similar name.

sangie595

*TwilightDelight* wrote: »

thx for the replies, it just states AEO and his National insurance number

*TwilightDelight* wrote: »

sangie595. are you an expert? just you seemed to know things but two advisors i spoke too never mentioned that his employer should know whose taken it BUT you did lol thx

No expert but I do know how to use Google and checked the HMRC and legal sites as to find out. An attachment of earnings or deduction of earnings order has to state where payments are to be made and within what timeframe. Something will have been sent to the employer to order the deductions. So these pieces of information exist in the employers files. If it is a deduction of earnings, it's a government type debt, and individual departments collect these themselves. So that will tell you which department is taking the money. If it is a attachment then it goes to a court that ordered it, and they can tell you what it is for.

MoneyMission2015

Hi Twilight

i've had to make deductions from staff where I work so I can confirm that whenever an AEO has been sent to us it states where it is from & also where payments have to be made. In one case it even told me what the AEO was for, but I don't recall this being the case on all 3. There is also a telephone number on the letters and forms that need to be filled in usually to confirm that the employee still works for us (on one occasion the employee had been fired the week before so I just called them up).

Also, it states on the letter that we (the employer) have to inform the employee every time we make a deduction, so in most cases on a regular salary this is a monthly deduction.

So what I'd suggest your husband to do is if he can actually go to the HR department in person, do that and ask them for everything relating to this. They must have some information because they need to pay the deduction on to the claimant every time they deduct it.

If he can't visit the HR department in person, tell him to keep calling them, hassle them about it really. If all else fails I suppose you could go down the route of submitting a subject access request, because then under the data protection act (I think), the company will have to provide your husband with all information they hold on him, I.e his personnel file.

Good luck x

*TwilightDelight*

Hi Twilight

i've had to make deductions from staff where I work so I can confirm that whenever an AEO has been sent to us it states where it is from & also where payments have to be made. In one case it even told me what the AEO was for, but I don't recall this being the case on all 3. There is also a telephone number on the letters and forms that need to be filled in usually to confirm that the employee still works for us (on one occasion the employee had been fired the week before so I just called them up).

Also, it states on the letter that we (the employer) have to inform the employee every time we make a deduction, so in most cases on a regular salary this is a monthly deduction.

So what I'd suggest your husband to do is if he can actually go to the HR department in person, do that and ask them for everything relating to this. They must have some information because they need to pay the deduction on to the claimant every time they deduct it.

If he can't visit the HR department in person, tell him to keep calling them, hassle them about it really. If all else fails I suppose you could go down the route of submitting a subject access request, because then under the data protection act (I think), the company will have to provide your husband with all information they hold on him, I.e his personnel file.

Good luck x

hi thx for the reply, so your saying his employer should've told him ? well they didn't only time he knew anything was on checking his payslip which he gets through email a day before he gets paid,but he won't give up until he finds out who it is, thank you

chrisbur

*TwilightDelight* wrote: »

hi thx for the reply, so your saying his employer should've told him ? well they didn't only time he knew anything was on checking his payslip which he gets through email a day before he gets paid,but he won't give up until he finds out who it is, thank you

The employer is obliged to give the employee an itemised advice of the deduction, provided the amount is listed on the payslip that is all that is required. Normally the employee should know the full details by the time they have the deduction taken; but if the employee disputes the deduction then the employer must give them details to allow them to contact the issuer of the AEO.
http://hmctsformfinder.justice.gov.uk/courtfinder/forms/ao-employers-guide-eng.pdf
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ChristineLouise

AEO is an Attachment Of Earnings order. I've processed a few usually unpaid council tax or child support but can be anything that has gone to court and now the employer has been ordered to deduct money and repay it to whomever it is owed. HMRC usually collect monies owed through readjusting your tax code so you pay more tax. An AEO should only be used where an order has been sent to deduct money and pay it over to whomever. Your payroll department has to know why they are deducting it and who they are paying it to. If a company does not action an AEO and deduct monies and repay them over then the company itself faces prosecution for failing to act, so stands to reason they should know! Usually before an AEO is sent to any employer you get a questionnaire on an employee asking how much they earn and so forth so the deductions can be worked out by the courts / those issuing the order.

*TwilightDelight*

hi just a quick update turns out was DWP it was an overpayment of JSA from 2001,he's been in touch and asked if it can be reduced,got it halved.so just want to say thank you all for the help

sangie595

Mystery solved. Thanks for letting us know what happened.

Guest101

Worth investigating I can't see JSA overpayment from 15 years ago being so large as to be more than one or two payments from a full time salary.

How long was he wrongly claiming?

lovinituk

sangie595 wrote: »

But the employer is paying the money to someone. It isn't collected by the tooth fairy. So whoever that someone is, is the one who had attached his earnings.

The employer has to send the money to HMCS (Her Majesty's Court Service).

From what I recall dealing with one of these as an employer, it doesn't state who the money is actually owed to. Just the total amount owed and how much must be paid each pay period.