Salary reduction based on usual travel costs

vorian

Hi all, if not posted in the correct place please let me know.
So my girlfriend has been working (from home) throughout the entire pandemic and has tried her best to play ball with her employer but it struggling with the latest request.

• We had A/L planned for two weeks and she was initially told that she could cancel and have those days back, they overturned that decision at director level (even though a manager was able to reclaim). It was decided that she could take half days.
• A lot of her colleagues were furloughed, consequently she was given extra work (and unable to take those A/L days).
• Also everyone who remained at work had their salary reduced to 80% until end of May.
• That was extended to the end of July.
  
• Originally had a travel loan for her train ticket, at the start of the lock down the company demanded that everyone pay those costs back, we did.

Yesterday (27/06/2020), a Saturday (they work M-F) she received confirmation that they are requesting those who are WFH need to fill out a form telling the company how much they usually spend on travel to get to work and that that amount will be deducted from their salary until they return to site...
There is nothing in her contract and they do not pay travel expenses.
She lives further out from their site (in London) than most of her colleagues and therefore her travel costs are rather significant (~£650 p/m).
Her 80% salary take-home p/m is £1707. 
If her salary returns to 100% (as suggested) and then have the travel sacrifice, her take-home would be £1386, £321 difference..
This feels wrong to me that they can discriminate against based on location. For me, you are paid to do a job for a salary and how you commute is up to you, not the company. 
They expect an answer accepting the proposal by Tuesday (30/06/2020).
Not sure what to do. Any comments or suggestions welcome.

jayzor

Personally i would tell them to get bent. They can’t force you to give that information. I guess the only thing to consider is how stable is the company and are they really struggling? I.e could staff sacrifices be the difference between them staying im business or not.

sharpe106

They have no legal right to that. I would politely ask them where this is in the contract. 

Thrugelmir

Sounds like an organisation in dire financial trouble. Not going about cost cutting in the right way. 

Jeremy535897

It's not 100% clear to me, but if what they are saying would reduce her wage while she is on furlough to below what they can claim under CJRS (80% of reference salary), they still have to pay her what they claim.

Vestraun

Just tell them nothing and she walks/cycles?

diggingdude

i certainly wouldn't pass on that info however i would be expecting the company to close soon/  Maybe you could respond asking how much they are saving on heating, lights, electricity and water etc in the work place

daveyjp

Its nonsense and the company are obviously in dire straights or run by a bunch of idiots that treat employees as fools.

They could also ask how much she has saved not paying for lunches, coffees, work clothes, going out for drinks with colleagues and deduct those too!

Semple

As others have said, it's very ridiculous. I would respond with 0, say that she normally gets a lift off a family member. Frankly if the company have to cut salaries due to financial issues, they should at least come out and say that to the employees. 

nyermen

"Also everyone who remained at work had their salary reduced to 80% until end of May"
Which presumably they agreed to formally, otherwise they were just underpaid for the period. But if they're looking for every penny, as said, I'd start looking for another job (sorry I know that's not easy now), as they're either going under or are such little whatever's that would she want to work there any more anyway?  Wait until the redundancies and subsequent increase in workload.

vorian

Hi all, thank you for your responses its very much appreciated.
Just to confirm she has not been furloughed but a number of her colleagues have been.
Yes the staff agreed (formally) to a temporary reduction of salary to 80% for that period.
The business is construction and handles multi-million pound projects and while some sites did close temporarily at the start of lockdown, the majority have re-opened and started work again.
I think we will pose some of those questions to her manager in a professional way and see what they say, some of her colleagues live within walking distance so would be £0 sacrifice. She does enjoy working for them and they are normally a nice company to work for. 
Thank you again.