Back to work after Furlough - concerns over employer pay

dfarry

Hi all,
Would appreciate some advice for my wife who has been back to work for two weeks now after being on Furlough.
She works in a small Cafe/Coffee Shop, normally a flat 40 hours and is paid £9 per hour.
When she was furloughed she was paid 80% of her salary (as was in 2019), £14,234.28.  Since the furlough rate is now 70% we assume her employer is receiving £830.33 per month for her.
During her first two weeks she has worked 32 hours in week 1 and 34 hours in week 2, her current rate of pay is £9 so she has earned £594 and for the rest of the month she is likely to work the same amount of time, to make it simpler lets say £1200 for the month.
Her employer has not been very clear about what she will receive, my view is irrespective of furlough, she should be paid what she has worked.  So based on the above the employer would have to top up roughly £370 in addition to what they receive.
However, is that even right, she's not working part time, the business is taking in money (admittedly not very much).
She is worried that she will work the hours and then be told she will only get £830.33 for the month.  If that's the case then she should really only work the equivalent number of hours (830.33/£9 = 92.25 hours) rather than the 132 that is looking likely.
To be honest I'm not sure the business will survive so there is an element of wondering if the employee is trying to drag out furlough, not top up anything and then hope that the two staff leave of their own accord rather than be made redundant (she has worked for 5 years with them and is 47.
If she doesn't get paid for the hours she worked then she might be tempted to leave and lose any subsequent redundancy payments, presumably this might affect her ability to receive income support etc?....
She's never been in this situation before so we'd really appreciate some clarity.

Thanks

Diamandis

She needs to be paid for the hours she works. If the other hours are being claimed under the flexible furlough scheme the employer will only be able to claim for those 6,or 8,hours and top up those hours to 80%. Why does she believe she won't be paid properly? Has something happened? Is she able to contact them to check? 

JReacher1

I’m a bit confused by this post. 

Your wife will be paid £9 an hour for the hours she has worked. If they pay her less than this they are potentially paying less than minimum wage. 

If your wife is back at work then her employer won’t be claiming furlough at 70% as that would be illegal. 

Potentially if your wife is not doing the full 40 hours she usually does there may be a chance she can receive furlough for any of the shortfall in hours. That would be 80% on those not worked hours. 

Why do you think her employer is not going to pay her properly?

Savvy_Sue

What does her contract say about her hours of work? You say 'normally' a flat 40 hours, but if she is on a flexible or zero hours contract, then if she is only asked to work 32 or 34 hours then that may be all she is entitled to be paid. 

dfarry

Hi all, thanks for your replies and I'm sorry for my slow reply.
I haven't seen her contract but from what I understand she is contracted for 40 hours.
The point made by @JReacher1 about not claiming furlough at 70% is what we also thought.  The way this has been pitched to her is that she will receive furlough at 70% plus hours works, which can't be right.  So we assume this to mean 70% plus topped up to cover the difference between £830.33 and whatever the difference would be, so for example 34 hours at £9 per hour.
At the moment the hours are fluctuating because they have so few customers so that's where the concern about pay comes from, she and her colleague are working the hours but they are not generating more than around £2-300 of takings each day.

dfarry

Just checked, she has asked this morning and been told here employer will be claiming 80% furlough and then paying the difference (at her hourly rate) for the hours worked.  So on that basis she should be fine.
Thanks

JReacher1

dfarry said:

Just checked, she has asked this morning and been told here employer will be claiming 80% furlough and then paying the difference (at her hourly rate) for the hours worked.  So on that basis she should be fine.
Thanks

Not really fine as this is against the rules. 

You can’t claim 80% furlough from the government if the person is working. 

Comms69

dfarry said:

Just checked, she has asked this morning and been told here employer will be claiming 80% furlough and then paying the difference (at her hourly rate) for the hours worked.  So on that basis she should be fine.
Thanks

Suggest she reports this to HMRC - funnily enough, without being rude, i dont fancy paying your wife's wages

TBagpuss

It sounds as though she is now on flexible furlough.

This means that she should get paid in full at her normal hourly rate  for the hours she actually works.
For the remaining hours she should get paid either 70% or 80% of her normal rate of pay, depending on what she has agreed with her employer. (hen people were furloughed, they will have agreed to a variation to their contract to get paid at a lower rate, unless their employer was topping up the furlough help received from the government. depending on the wording of the letter or other agreement she signed, she should either get 70 or 80% of her normal pay for the hours she doesn't work.

So if her normal hours were 40 a week, and she is currently working 34 hours a week, her pay should be 34 x £9 + 6 x £7.20 (80%)/ £6.30 (70%) . getting paid less than the minimum wage for furlough is permitted, but she has to be paid at least minimum wage for time she actually works. 

The employers have to pay the correct amount based on her actual working hours and the amount of time she is furloughed,  how much they then get back from HMRC is not your wife's problem, but as the reimbursement is based on what they submit ot HMRC it's up to them to make sure that they work the number out correctly when the send in their payroll information. 

dfarry

TBagpuss said:

It sounds as though she is now on flexible furlough.

This means that she should get paid in full at her normal hourly rate  for the hours she actually works.
For the remaining hours she should get paid either 70% or 80% of her normal rate of pay, depending on what she has agreed with her employer. (hen people were furloughed, they will have agreed to a variation to their contract to get paid at a lower rate, unless their employer was topping up the furlough help received from the government. depending on the wording of the letter or other agreement she signed, she should either get 70 or 80% of her normal pay for the hours she doesn't work.

So if her normal hours were 40 a week, and she is currently working 34 hours a week, her pay should be 34 x £9 + 6 x £7.20 (80%)/ £6.30 (70%) . getting paid less than the minimum wage for furlough is permitted, but she has to be paid at least minimum wage for time she actually works. 

The employers have to pay the correct amount based on her actual working hours and the amount of time she is furloughed,  how much they then get back from HMRC is not your wife's problem, but as the reimbursement is based on what they submit ot HMRC it's up to them to make sure that they work the number out correctly when the send in their payroll information. 

Hi and thanks for your detailed response.

So on this basis she'd actually get paid more than she was expecting?... She was expecting to get just hours worked, but the unworked hours (due to her contacted 40 hours) would be based on the furlough rate.
In effect would the employer still be claiming the full amount of monthly furlough at the appropriate rate but then making up the difference to cover the contacted 40 hours?

KatrinaWaves

No. That’s not what TBagpuss said at all.

Her employer pay her for what she works. Normal rate (unless she agrees something else) no furlough. She’s working. Furlough doesn’t pay people to work.

the difference between her current working hours and her current contracted hours would be claimed through furlough. 

She works 32 hours, she is paid for that normally and then They claim 8 hours furlough to top up to 40hours, so she’ll get the remaining 8 hours at whatever % furlough is