Employer refusing to pay owed holiday after leaving. Now court!?

neuspeed

Hello all!

This is my first post on MSE, however I am in need of some serious advice if anyone could help. It's a little complicated so I will try to keep it as simple as possible!

In short - I have resigned from my job and my employer won't pay me my owed holiday on my last payslip or give me my P45. Instead, they want to pay me my holiday pay (roughly £400) in instalments over 6 pay runs! And are now talking about taking ME to court!


I have just resigned from a part-time cafe job in which I was getting no hours. I did some elements of graphic and web design for them, mainly while on shift getting paid my rate for being at work (no extra) and 9 hours of graphic design at home.

I emailed my manager (he is the owner) stating I would be resigning and had attached my period of notice and formal resignation to the email. I asked if I could have all outstanding holiday pay owed on my last pay packet and my P45, as I am legally owed this from them.

He replied stating that they would be paying my holiday pay in instalments over 6 pay runs (I get paid fortnightly, so that's 12 weeks). I replied saying that this is not right as I am leaving the company and would like to request all my monies owed to me on my last pay day.

I rang ACAS and they advised me to write or email a letter to my manager asking for a formal request of my monies owed by a reasonable date ie. 7 days or my next/last payday. I emailed work just that, stating in my email I had received legal advice from a non-profit organisation helpline and the response I received was shocking.

The manager first stated that I was threatening him with legal action over me not receiving work hours. His spelling is also awful and doesn't make much sense at the best of times. He also using lots of phrases in CAPS within his email, just not professional.
This is not at all what I said or am intending. He then brings up the topic about court.

He told me that court is the last thing he wants to do as it will cost ME a lot of money. He then tells me that half of my owed holiday money (£200) is through "Working from Home hours" (for 9 hours of graphic design) And IF I wish to proceed with legal action he will get in a 'Professional Media Company' team to go through all the work I have done at home with media to get a second opinion on the hours and if it really took me 9 hours to do graphic work for them.
Which I think is silly for a few pieces of work designed from home. I'm not sure if it's all talk or threats towards me now!

He will then pursue the case to court and argue that I have put down more hours than what I have actually done.
9 hours of work really isn't much for a graphic designer working on multiple pieces of work. These included 2 new menus for the cafe, social media images and a weeks worth of website design for them. I also don't get paid for maintaining the website, which is time consuming.

I then receive another email straight after stating that this week he will instruct a 'Degree Graduates from Oxford University, along with the 'UKs second largest media company' to inspect all my work and get a second opinion if what I have put down is genuine. He say's I could then end up losing holiday pay from this. He then states again I am threatening him with legal action and that is unfair.
How could anybody possibly assess wether or not my design work has taken 1 hour, 5 hours or 10 hours? I would regularly sit down during work designing posters, not getting paid any extra for doing this.

I have a very well written response to all of this as he doesn't really know what he's talking about.

If you managed to make it through all that waffling, does anyone have any advice or comments on the matter? I feel incredibly stressed and emotional with all this as all I want to do is claim my holiday pay, P45 and leave the company on good terms!

Many Thanks.
Neus:beer:

paddedjohn

Call the idiots bluff, use small claims court

System

As above. £35 to file a claim online. Bloke is an idiot, time to call his bluff.

getmore4less

It won't matter how long YOU took.

you did work said it was 9hrs worth and they paid it

They also have agreed the holiday pay is due.


next time you are on a flexible hours contract and want to leave because you are not getting enough work book all you accrued holiday and get it paid first.

if a zero hours you don't even have to resign just book the holiday, get another job,turn down any new work.

jobbingmusician

There are two different issues here, to my way of thinking. (I'm not an expert, just someone who has been a manager.)

1. Holiday pay. This is cut and dried and there is no problem with issuing a small claim. Just google MCOL (money claim online). It's easy and cheap.

2. Payment for your work at home. What was actually agreed about this? Do you have any written agreement about how many hours they will pay and what you would produce in this time? I do agree with you that 9 hours is a minimal amount, and to me it sounds as if you have a legitimate claim to this money. But there's whole spectrum of possible scenarios here, from you vaguely offering to do some design work and then hitting them with a bill for 9 hours to them specifying a max amount of time and what they wanted within this time. (And probably some other scenarios I haven't thought of).

Because these are two separate issues, should you issue 2 MCOLs? I have no idea - it depends partly on the answers to part 2.

The only real disadvantage to MCOL for your holiday pay is that it will take time. Part of me thinks you might just as well save yourself the hassle and wait for the lengthy payment (assuming you think they will pay up). But a much larger part is annoyed on your behalf and would definitely pursue it. And you will get interest on the late payment!

Stage 1 of issuing a MCOL, by the way, is to send a Letter Before Action, headed as such, informing the employer you propose to open a claim if your money is not paid in full by (ACAS suggests 7 days, and this sounds sensible).

Marcon

Why pay to use the MCOL process? The correct approach, given you have only recently resigned (and are therefore within the time limit for doing so) is to claim via an Employment Tribunal: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/make-a-claim-to-an-employment-tribunal-form-et1

Savvy_Sue

Marcon wrote: »

Why pay to use the MCOL process? The correct approach, given you have only recently resigned (and are therefore within the time limit for doing so) is to claim via an Employment Tribunal: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/make-a-claim-to-an-employment-tribunal-form-et1

I believe small claims would be faster, plus if the OP goes to ET and the employer goes to small claims, it's going to get messy (messier).

Personally I think if he's threatening court, I'd get in there first.

Masomnia

Sorry OP but personally I think you're overreacting here a bit.

Your former employer hasn't said he won't pay the money, he's saying he wants to pay it over a period of time. Probably because of their cash flow. 12 weeks is a long time so yes I'd have a chat with him about that, but I'm not really surprised that you've got his back up and he's threatening to counter sue when you've gone legal to begin with.

I don't know how quickly you'll get the money by going through small claims, but by the time you've written a letter before action, he's responded, the hearing has been arranged etc I can't imagine you'll have it all that much quicker than if you just agreed to having it in installments. All you're going to win is money that he has agreed to pay you anyway.

I'm not saying that he's in the right, but it doesn't sound like either of you have approached this constructively.

Masomnia

Savvy_Sue wrote: »

I believe small claims would be faster, plus if the OP goes to ET and the employer goes to small claims, it's going to get messy (messier).

Yes the tribunal system is at breaking point! I've heard of multi-day cases (which this wouldn't be, but still) now not being listed until 2021, so if OP goes down the tribunal route it's not going to be heard any time soon.

It would have to go through ACAS conciliation first at which point the employer might just pay up but it doesn't sound like he will.

neuspeed

Hi all,

Thanks for your replies. Your time responding is very much appreciated.

I can confirm that the employer has agreed to pay me the full sum of holiday owed on my final pay packet. With his over reactive email, I replied in a professional manner stating I had not claimed to be chasing legal action against him and I merely claimed legal advice, and was in no way threatening.

He apologised and said he may have got the wrong end of the stick and that my holiday will be paid and has dropped all issues on the "Working from Home hours".

A bit of a funny situation / dodgy employer. I wasn't the only member of staff with issues getting money owed. Also, all of my holiday pay (£400) was worked out from shifts I had done at the venue. He claimed half of my holiday was owed from 'Working at Home' hours, which is nonsense as I had only done 9 hours at home the entire time of working there. Soon as I brought that up, his toned changed completely.



Confusion, misunderstanding or money troubles and finding a way not to pay staff I'm not sure. Think I'll stick working for well known companies with more structure. I feel sometimes the independently owed companies will try rip staff off to save on costs.

Thanks again,
Neus.

lincroft1710

neuspeed wrote: »

Think I'll stick working for well known companies with more structure. I feel sometimes the independently owed companies will try rip staff off to save on costs.

There have been a few threads on this board about well known companies who also try to short change their employees.