Wages & Employment law help please!!

MeWho

Right I've got a question about wages & employment law, I apologise if I've posted this in the wrong area but I'm also desperately in need of help/advice, so I'll explain my situation as best I can & hopefully someone can follow & help.

My employer usually pays weekly on a Friday and by usually I mean it's every week unless you book a week off, then on your last Friday you get two weeks wage. Take your week off, go back on the Monday and get a weeks pay on the Friday. A couple of weeks ago my boss came around & put up a notice detailing changes to the pay over xmas & new year. I've (hopefully) managed to include a pic of the novice on this thread. (Apparently new users can't post links, so I've had to write down what was on the pic) Now key to this story is that I have the week booked off over xmas (as do many of the staff) by virtue of booking the Monday, Tuesday & Friday off. The notice stated this: (exactly like this)

Hi all

Please note the following pay dates for Christmas 2019

Pay date

20/12/19

Hours worked W.E 13/12/19
Any unpaid holidays taken in 2019 that weren't accrued

27/12/19
Hours worked W.E 20/12/19
Standard hours for Monday 23/12/19 & Tuesday 24/12/19
2x Bank Holidays for 25/12/19 & 26/12/19
1x holiday for 27/12/19 (if booked, otherwise unpaid time off for this day)

03/01/20
No payroll will be processed on this day

10/01/20
Hours worked W.E 03/01/20
Any additions/subtractions to hours worked W.E 27/12/19

Nowhere on these did it say what pay the people who had booked the week ending 27th off would recieve. A few people including myself questioned this, and my boss assured us that we would recieve 2 weeks pay on the 20th then a weeks pay on the 27th. 20th came & I recieved 2 weeks wages (one weeks pay, one weeks holiday pay). 27th came, I checked my bank & found out I'd been paid £48:20. Now I'll admit, I do work at minimum wage but it's also for 37.5 hours a week. I'd also done Saturday 21st as overtime, meaning my wage was roughly £260 down on what it should have been.
Now from the sounds of it I'm not the only one this has happened too, pretty much everyone who booked the week off has recieved only a fraction of their wage whereas the folks who didn't book it off all recieved 2 weeks pay.
Now my employer expects me to go back to work on the 2nd of Jan, but to not pay me (or anyone else) until the 10th of Jan. I've got the wage they gave me & not much else (I stupidly took my boss at his word when he said we'd be paid, and was expecting the full amount to be paid) to now last me until it looks like the 10th of Jan. And like most people I've got bills, rent & other commitments to pay that are due out in the first week of the month, as I was expecting I'd still have a weeks wage and a bit left by then, not £48 and change. I'm stressed, it's 6am on the 28th & I'm already panicking about how I'm going to get out of this mess I've been placed in.

My questions are these:

Would my employer changing the date of paying us as well as not paying us for a week constitute a breach of contract? I'm pretty sure in our contract it states we'll be paid each week (I've worked there nearly 6 years, and this is the first time they've ever done anything like this. I've also not seen my contract since the day I signed it years ago) and it's not like any hardship negotiation was offered, the notice went up (and is it just me or is it really hard to understand? What I've put is honestly what it says on the notice down to the letter, & a fair few people including myself had to have it explained), people in my situation got told we would get paid and that was that.

And if anyone was in my situation, what would they do upon returning to work? Please no suggestions of walking into my boss's office & verbally tearing him a new one. As much as I'd love too, that won't get me anywhere other than sacked. At the same time I do feel like I (& everyone else who booked the week off) is getting royally screwed. In two minds whether to go back or not but as anyone who has ever had to work minimum wage knows, if you find yourself desperate enough to work for that rate of pay then you don't exactly have many good paying options available & you can't exactly afford to walk out on a reliable job.

soolin

Moved to the Employment board

Undervalued

MeWho wrote: »

Right I've got a question about wages & employment law, I apologise if I've posted this in the wrong area but I'm also desperately in need of help/advice, so I'll explain my situation as best I can & hopefully someone can follow & help.

My employer usually pays weekly on a Friday and by usually I mean it's every week unless you book a week off, then on your last Friday you get two weeks wage. Take your week off, go back on the Monday and get a weeks pay on the Friday. A couple of weeks ago my boss came around & put up a notice detailing changes to the pay over xmas & new year. I've (hopefully) managed to include a pic of the novice on this thread. (Apparently new users can't post links, so I've had to write down what was on the pic) Now key to this story is that I have the week booked off over xmas (as do many of the staff) by virtue of booking the Monday, Tuesday & Friday off. The notice stated this: (exactly like this)

Hi all

Please note the following pay dates for Christmas 2019

Pay date

20/12/19

Hours worked W.E 13/12/19
Any unpaid holidays taken in 2019 that weren't accrued

27/12/19
Hours worked W.E 20/12/19
Standard hours for Monday 23/12/19 & Tuesday 24/12/19
2x Bank Holidays for 25/12/19 & 26/12/19
1x holiday for 27/12/19 (if booked, otherwise unpaid time off for this day)

03/01/20
No payroll will be processed on this day

10/01/20
Hours worked W.E 03/01/20
Any additions/subtractions to hours worked W.E 27/12/19

Nowhere on these did it say what pay the people who had booked the week ending 27th off would recieve. A few people including myself questioned this, and my boss assured us that we would recieve 2 weeks pay on the 20th then a weeks pay on the 27th. 20th came & I recieved 2 weeks wages (one weeks pay, one weeks holiday pay). 27th came, I checked my bank & found out I'd been paid £48:20. Now I'll admit, I do work at minimum wage but it's also for 37.5 hours a week. I'd also done Saturday 21st as overtime, meaning my wage was roughly £260 down on what it should have been.
Now from the sounds of it I'm not the only one this has happened too, pretty much everyone who booked the week off has recieved only a fraction of their wage whereas the folks who didn't book it off all recieved 2 weeks pay.
Now my employer expects me to go back to work on the 2nd of Jan, but to not pay me (or anyone else) until the 10th of Jan. I've got the wage they gave me & not much else (I stupidly took my boss at his word when he said we'd be paid, and was expecting the full amount to be paid) to now last me until it looks like the 10th of Jan. And like most people I've got bills, rent & other commitments to pay that are due out in the first week of the month, as I was expecting I'd still have a weeks wage and a bit left by then, not £48 and change. I'm stressed, it's 6am on the 28th & I'm already panicking about how I'm going to get out of this mess I've been placed in.

My questions are these:

Would my employer changing the date of paying us as well as not paying us for a week constitute a breach of contract? I'm pretty sure in our contract it states we'll be paid each week (I've worked there nearly 6 years, and this is the first time they've ever done anything like this. I've also not seen my contract since the day I signed it years ago) and it's not like any hardship negotiation was offered, the notice went up (and is it just me or is it really hard to understand? What I've put is honestly what it says on the notice down to the letter, & a fair few people including myself had to have it explained), people in my situation got told we would get paid and that was that.

And if anyone was in my situation, what would they do upon returning to work? Please no suggestions of walking into my boss's office & verbally tearing him a new one. As much as I'd love too, that won't get me anywhere other than sacked. At the same time I do feel like I (& everyone else who booked the week off) is getting royally screwed. In two minds whether to go back or not but as anyone who has ever had to work minimum wage knows, if you find yourself desperate enough to work for that rate of pay then you don't exactly have many good paying options available & you can't exactly afford to walk out on a reliable job.

Well "pretty sure" doesn't cut it!

Firstly you need to establish exactly what your contract says. Then you need to double check whether there have been any amendments to the contract in the last six years. Remember, an employer can change your terms and if you do not formally object but carry on working you are deemed to have accepted the change.

If your contract guarantees you a particular pay date (and there have been no amendments) then yes, on the face of it, your employer is in breach of contract. If you suffer a financial loss as a result (despite making reasonable efforts to minimise any loss) then, in theory at least, your employer is liable.

That said, as you yourself acknowledge, you need to approach this with care. First find out exactly what the contractual position is. If it is as you fondly believe, then you could approach your employer politely (i.e don't "rip him a new one"!!) and see what he says.

MeWho

Well I apologise that I can't remember the exact wording on my contract, it's been a long while since I've looked at it. Nothing like this has happened before in the 6 years I've been there. Considering giving acas a ring on Monday,

Takeaway_Addict

MeWho wrote: »

Well I apologise that I can't remember the exact wording on my contract, it's been a long while since I've looked at it. Nothing like this has happened before in the 6 years I've been there. Considering giving acas a ring on Monday,

This would be pointless until you find out exactly what your contract states.

Plus realistically by the time you get anywhere with the issue the employer by the sounds of it will be paid

Undervalued

MeWho wrote: »

Well I apologise that I can't remember the exact wording on my contract, it's been a long while since I've looked at it. Nothing like this has happened before in the 6 years I've been there. Considering giving acas a ring on Monday,

Well by all means do. However I think the first thing they will ask you is what does your contract say.

MeWho

But that's part of the problem. Employer wants people back at work on the 2nd (Thursday), wants to not pay us on the 3rd (Friday) so the darling office staff (the ones who were meant to have taken care of all the pay situation before they finished for xmas & new year) can have that full week off & return to work on the 6th of Jan (Monday) and then pay us as normal on the 10th, even though half the staff will have had to go 3 weeks without a full wage at that point. By the time I & everyone else goes back to work, the matter won't have been resolved as there's nobody in to sort it out. I work on a factory floor as a machine operator, the office staff don't even work in the same building as us.

MeWho

So by the time the 3rd comes half the staff will be owed 2 weeks wages, by the 10th that'll be 3 weeks. Did I mention I work for a company that tried to illegally change our contracts around 6 months ago to drop the rate of overtime pay for people like myself that are over 25 down to normal time. That quickly got shut down, but that's the sort of place I'm dealing with here

Undervalued

MeWho wrote: »

But that's part of the problem. Employer wants people back at work on the 2nd (Thursday), wants to not pay us on the 3rd (Friday) so the darling office staff (the ones who were meant to have taken care of all the pay situation before they finished for xmas & new year) can have that full week off & return to work on the 6th of Jan (Monday) and then pay us as normal on the 10th, even though half the staff will have had to go 3 weeks without a full wage at that point. By the time I & everyone else goes back to work, the matter won't have been resolved as there's nobody in to sort it out. I work on a factory floor as a machine operator, the office staff don't even work in the same building as us.

But as I said, until you establish whether the "small print" of your contract (and any subsequent amendments) allows them to delay payment there is little you can do. It probably doesn't, in which case the employer is liable for any unavoidable losses this has caused the staff. If that is indeed the case, but asking the employer nicely doesn't get you anywhere, then you have a difficult decision to make about how far you push the matter. Theoretically it would be unfair dismissal to sack an employee for asserting a legal right but again you have to balance that with the real world.

I assume as you are asking here you are not a member of a trades union?

MeWho

I've asked a couple of people who work there & are in the same boat as me (expecting a weeks pay, recieved a lot less than that) if they know where their contracts are & if so could they dig them out for me but I'm waiting for them to get back to me.
No, unfortunately I'm not a member of a trades union, nor is there anyone in my work I could approach about it. We're all just minimum wage monkeys 😪

Savvy_Sue

MeWho wrote: »

Did I mention I work for a company that tried to illegally change our contracts around 6 months ago to drop the rate of overtime pay for people like myself that are over 25 down to normal time.

I'm not sure what was 'illegal' about that, but there is no legal requirement to pay extra for overtime, as long as it is at least NMW (or living wage if you prefer to call it that ...)

MeWho wrote: »

No, unfortunately I'm not a member of a trades union, nor is there anyone in my work I could approach about it. We're all just minimum wage monkeys 😪

Well, now would be a good time to join, before you need their services again.


And it may well be worth you getting over to the Debt Free board, to start working out how you could build up a small buffer, so that any future issues with pay won't leave you in this state of panic.