Pay rates for working in -24 degrees

Misslayed

I'm prompted to ask for information due to the recent successful discrimination challenge by female employees of Asda. My husband worked in Asda for a couple of (miserable) years, he was in the freezer dept, working a large part of every day in the back up freezer which was kept at -24 degrees. He regularly worked alone, had to fight for protective clothing and often missed breaks if a delivery lorry arrived as frozen food left out of the freezer for more than 30 minutes had to be wasted. He was paid the same miserable hourly rate as other shop floor staff. At some point he learned that colleagues working in the freezer distribution centre were paid at a higher rate, and it was suggested that he should have also had the higher rate as he worked in the freezer. Does anyone have any experience/information/advice about this? He hasn't worked there for some time btw. :snow_grin

stator

Were the staff in the freezer distribution centre women, or a different race ?
In order for discrimination cases to succeed I think you need some form of discrimination. Geography isn't a protected minority, ie you can't say someone working in Nottingham is paid more than me, that's discrimination, even if you're only paid half what they are. But if most of the people in nottingham are women and you're a man, you have a slim chance of a case.

agrinnall

Depending on how long it is since he left ASDA he may well be out if time to bring an Employment Tribunal case anyway.

Misslayed

All of the above I imagine! Sorry I didn't explain myself very well, I didn't mean there was discrimination in that sense, it was the success of the recent case that reminded me. It was more to do with being paid different rates in different working conditions, i.e. people working in the freezer at the distribution centre were paid more than those in ambient areas (because of the cold conditions), whereas the same differential didn't apply in store.

Undervalued

Misslayed wrote: »

All of the above I imagine! Sorry I didn't explain myself very well, I didn't mean there was discrimination in that sense, it was the success of the recent case that reminded me. It was more to do with being paid different rates in different working conditions, i.e. people working in the freezer at the distribution centre were paid more than those in ambient areas (because of the cold conditions), whereas the same differential didn't apply in store.

Supply and demand probably and certainly not unlawful.

Because somebody has a less pleasant job doesn't in itself give any right to higher pay. Equally the fact that somebody doing a similar job elsewhere in the company gets more doesn't mean he has to be paid the same. If they paid a man more than a woman for doing the exact same job, that would be unlawful.

Darksparkle

The people I work with that do the exact same job as me all get paid differently depending on when they started, their terms and conditions etc. People who do the exact same job in London also get paid more and work less hours. It's not unlawful.