Employer Claiming the over paid redundancy

unome

Hi,
I am hoping for a little advice.
Following my redundancy from my part time TTO role. I received a redundancy statement from my employer, which stated two elements statutory and local authority.

Based on this, I decided not to appeal my redundancy and accept a lower paid job else ware, on the understanding that I could use this sum to pay off debts.

I was duly paid the total of the two figures quoted in my statement.

A few days later (at this point I had used the money to pay off interest free credit cards). I received a letter from my employers’ payroll company to inform me that I had been over paid and that I should only have received the local authority element and that I owe them approximately 3.5k

On receiving this, I looked further into my contract and redundancy statement and noticed:

• My employer had worked out my salary for redundancy proposes based on my term time salary divided by 52.143 weeks, rather than the weeks I work (this is incorrect).

• My employer had been underpaying me the entire time, I worked for them as they did not take into account the fact that I had 30 days’ annual leave due to length of service (previous LA employee)

As such, if their assertions that I was not entitled to both elements is correct, on balance the amount owed is approx. £600.

I have queried them on this and they refuse to admit any error. So am unsure how to proceed.

Due to the length of time taken for them to respond to my queries, I am outside of the time limits for employment tribunal so suspect the course of events will inevitably end up with them taking me to the small claims court.

My main question is in the event of this, do I need to put in a counter claim for the money I consider they owe me, or as I currently have the funds should I just defend the amount claimed?

Also, I know it’s a difficult case to argue, but what are my chances of a defence of estoppel due to the funds being received and spent in good faith?

tlc678910

Hi, were you in a union?
If you were they should be able to represent you and offer legal advice as part of your membership.

I wonder if ACAS can help or can refer you to the correct organisation

"ACAS (Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service) provides free and impartial information and advice to employers and employees on all aspects of workplace relations and employment law. We support good relationships between employers and employees which underpin business success. But when things go wrong we help by providing conciliation to resolve workplace problems."

Good luck TLC