Zero Hour - Quitting and contract wording

Eric5765

My girlfriend is wanting to quit her zero hour job as she has had problems with being underpaid by almost 15% and being given the run around on it, given ridiculous shifts (Finishing at 11:30pm and starting next day at 5am, so about 4 hours sleep total) and a number of other issues leaving her extremely unhappy and exhausted.

Her contract has an undisclosed 'training cost' charge stating that employees leaving within a year are required to pay an unknown training cost, which her colleagues rumored to be a flat £250. For starters, she has had no 'formal' training that she has signed off on and was basically thrown in the deep end.

I thought one way to get around this rubbish would be to just ask them to just not put her on the next rota - and after etc until they terminate it on their end so she isn't technically quitting.

The only two issues I'm not sure on are that her contract does have a 28 day notice period, which doesn't make much sense considering it's a zero hour contract and she isn't obliged to work?

The second point is some weird wording along the lines of 'you agree that you will be available to work when hours are provided'....Isn't this just trying to have their cake and eat it? The way it read to me is that they are effectively saying 'you arent allowed to turn down work but we are allowed to not give you any work'

Any thoughts on this? I would have thought they can't remove your rights under a zero hour contract by telling you that you need to work if they say so. Could she get away with just telling them to not put her on the rota without saying she's officially quitting while she finds something better in the meantime?

dacouch

What if anything does the contract say about the training costs?

Is she on minimum wage?

Is she taken below minimum wage when she is underpaid and if so do they correct the mistakes

Eric5765

Hi,

She's on minimum wage and the contract simply says that if an employee quits within their first year then they will be asked to pay back training costs.

Other people have been having similar problems with being underpaid for worked hours and she is still currently trying to chase it up with her manager.

We are mainly interested in whether or not she is fine to quit by just telling them she doesn't want hours anymore or if that would be classed as her quitting considering her contract says they want a notice period.

sangie595

Given the terms you describe, regardless of what the employer claims, this is not a zero hour contact. She is an employer. If the terms about not being able to refuse work etc., are correct, then I am certain of that.

I don't think the training costs clause stands up legally either. Such costs must be clearly stated and commensurate with actual cost incurred. If there has been no training, they cannot do that.

My advice would be to simply wait until she is paid, then refuse further shifts and issue a letter before action/ court action for the owed money. They won't like it, but there's nothing they can do. Unless she actually really did have training.

Eric5765

Thanks for the reply.

Re whether or not she had training, I guess that depends what constitutes training. She was shown how to do this and that on the job, but half the things she should be able to do she can't because of lack of training, and she has not signed off on any kind of training or had any kind of dedicated training sessions (This is despite asking multiple times to be given the training she needed in certain areas because she wasn't able to do her job properly)

Annoying thing with her pay is that the work month is 15th>16th then you get paid for those hours on the 29th, so regardless of when she leaves she will have a few weeks worth of a final paycheck that they can presumably try and dock arbitrary training costs from.

We keep her shifts organized in a spreadsheet to do some rough payment calculations as well as keep track of her hours as she swaps and covers a lot, and last month on her payslip she was paid for something like 110 hours when what we had tracked (And we included things such as not being paid for breaks etc) was 125 hours. A lot of other employees have complained that they think they have been underpaid over the last few months, but at 23 she is the oldest non-senior person there and I get the feeling that it's just another company who hire young people on zero hour contracts that they can use and abuse without too much pushback.

Either way she's incredibly exhausted/upset and crying after work every night with how she is being treated sometimes, so regardless of this we just want an easy way out.

sangie595

Well the easy way out (actually, the only one) is that she refuses further shifts and takes legal action if they don't pay her. Or writes off what she is owed if she can't/won't do that. They certainly can't hold her to the notice since they claim it's a zero hours contract!

Or, and I would normally never advocate this, but given the type of employer and her zero hours contract - go sick on 16th (when paid) and have a really nasty cold that lasts two weeks. Or stress. Or, in fact, anything at all. Stress is excellent - doctors will usually sign you off for a couple of weeks! Your last sentence will do to get a fit note to cover the period.

Jamiesmum

I think in regards to the 'having to work' it might be something similar to taking so many hours over a month. The company I work for has a minimum 8 hours work for every month for our 0 hour people. They don't state it in the contract though. It's only if it's available and they can't cover it.

Best to just find out more about the training costs and go from there. Tell her to send it in an email, and if it's ridiculous just state that she can't work for the next 4 weeks due to whatever commitment and see what their response is.

agrinnall

sangie595 wrote: »

Given the terms you describe, regardless of what the employer claims, this is not a zero hour contact. She is an employer. If the terms about not being able to refuse work etc., are correct, then I am certain of that.

For the sake of clarity, and to avoid any possible confusion, the second sentence should read:

She is an employee.

sangie595

agrinnall wrote: »

For the sake of clarity, and to avoid any possible confusion, the second sentence should read:

She is an employee.

Yes, sorry - it's late and my predictive keyboard is prone to typing whatever it wants at the best of times!

sangie595

Jamiesmum wrote: »

I think in regards to the 'having to work' it might be something similar to taking so many hours over a month. The company I work for has a minimum 8 hours work for every month for our 0 hour people. They don't state it in the contract though. It's only if it's available and they can't cover it..

Nope. If you have to work, then it isn't a zero hour contract. Full stop. The law is very clear on that. If your company requires people to work, even for a single hour, then they are not on zero hour contracts. And the distinction is very important in law, because people with zero hour contracts are workers and not employees, so they have few rights.