Admin charges on overpay repayments?

Kate_kt

Hiya! I wonder if anyone can help.
I left a job and three months later received a letter stating that they had unfortunately overpaid me by over £1000, they were sorry for this mistake but I was asked to return this amount within 14 days! This didn't make any sense to me and naturally was super stressful to hear. I looked into this further and it was discovered that my employers got this amount wrong as they had documented my leaving date incorrectly and input a lot less hours for my final month than the hours that I actually worked. The repayment amount was reduced to around £400. I said I wasn't in the position to pay this back at once, and would send £10 a month. I didn't state a start date to when I would begin these repayments. I forgot to get round to it (my fault) and have been contacted again saying that I have failed to keep the arrangement and should start repaying (fair enough!) Quick note that I did not receive any reminders between my "I'll pay £10 a month" email and their "You have have failed to keep arrangement, despite a reminder, start repayments immediately to avoid this being passed on to recovery procedures, a course of action that I trust will not be required" email. Anyway! I have noticed they have now added an administration charge, that has not been mentioned previously - is this normal practise? Should I be asking why/on what grounds they are adding additional charges? Or is this to be expected? 

Any advice welcome! Thanks!

Marcon

Kate_kt said:

Hiya! I wonder if anyone can help.
I left a job and three months later received a letter stating that they had unfortunately overpaid me by over £1000, they were sorry for this mistake but I was asked to return this amount within 14 days! This didn't make any sense to me and naturally was super stressful to hear. I looked into this further and it was discovered that my employers got this amount wrong as they had documented my leaving date incorrectly and input a lot less hours for my final month than the hours that I actually worked. The repayment amount was reduced to around £400. I said I wasn't in the position to pay this back at once, and would send £10 a month. I didn't state a start date to when I would begin these repayments. I forgot to get round to it (my fault) and have been contacted again saying that I have failed to keep the arrangement and should start repaying (fair enough!) Quick note that I did not receive any reminders between my "I'll pay £10 a month" email and their "You have have failed to keep arrangement, despite a reminder, start repayments immediately to avoid this being passed on to recovery procedures, a course of action that I trust will not be required" email. Anyway! I have noticed they have now added an administration charge, that has not been mentioned previously - is this normal practise? Should I be asking why/on what grounds they are adding additional charges? Or is this to be expected? 

Any advice welcome! Thanks!

Get a standing order set up for £10 a month and make sure it has a start date and an end date. Reply telling them what you have done and that you cannot undertake to pay 'administration charges' as you have not agreed to do so. Leave it at that and see what happens - probably nothing if you start repayments pronto.

Kate_kt

Marcon said:

Kate_kt said:

Hiya! I wonder if anyone can help.
I left a job and three months later received a letter stating that they had unfortunately overpaid me by over £1000, they were sorry for this mistake but I was asked to return this amount within 14 days! This didn't make any sense to me and naturally was super stressful to hear. I looked into this further and it was discovered that my employers got this amount wrong as they had documented my leaving date incorrectly and input a lot less hours for my final month than the hours that I actually worked. The repayment amount was reduced to around £400. I said I wasn't in the position to pay this back at once, and would send £10 a month. I didn't state a start date to when I would begin these repayments. I forgot to get round to it (my fault) and have been contacted again saying that I have failed to keep the arrangement and should start repaying (fair enough!) Quick note that I did not receive any reminders between my "I'll pay £10 a month" email and their "You have have failed to keep arrangement, despite a reminder, start repayments immediately to avoid this being passed on to recovery procedures, a course of action that I trust will not be required" email. Anyway! I have noticed they have now added an administration charge, that has not been mentioned previously - is this normal practise? Should I be asking why/on what grounds they are adding additional charges? Or is this to be expected? 

Any advice welcome! Thanks!

Get a standing order set up for £10 a month and make sure it has a start date and an end date. Reply telling them what you have done and that you cannot undertake to pay 'administration charges' as you have not agreed to do so. Leave it at that and see what happens - probably nothing if you start repayments pronto.

Thank you for this suggestion - super helpful!

Undervalued

So, by any reckoning you were overpaid by around £400 but you didn't notice? 

It is as much the employee's responsibility to ensure that their pay is correct as it is the employer's. Yes, they should have got it right but they are fully entitled to to ask for prompt repayment of any accidental overpayment, just as you would no doubt have done had it been the other way round. 

There is no automatic right to pay it back in "easy instalments" and £10 a month for three and a half years is generous on their part to say the least! If they took you to court you would be ordered to pay at a rate the judge decided you could afford, which in most cases would be significantly more that £10 a month. You would also have pay their court fee. If you defaulted on that they could take enforcement action and the considerable costs of that would be added to the debt.

You have already failed to honour the agreement you made to start paying £10 when you "forgot to get round to it"! Are you really surprised they are getting stroppy?

Can they add an "admin charge". Possibly not but that can take you to court and cost you a good deal more!

Kate_kt

Undervalued said:

So, by any reckoning you were overpaid by around £400 but you didn't notice? 

It is as much the employee's responsibility to ensure that their pay is correct as it is the employer's. Yes, they should have got it right but they are fully entitled to to ask for prompt repayment of any accidental overpayment, just as you would no doubt have done had it been the other way round. 

There is no automatic right to pay it back in "easy instalments" and £10 a month for three and a half years is generous on their part to say the least! If they took you to court you would be ordered to pay at a rate the judge decided you could afford, which in most cases would be significantly more that £10 a month. You would also have pay their court fee. If you defaulted on that they could take enforcement action and the considerable costs of that would be added to the debt.

You have already failed to honour the agreement you made to start paying £10 when you "forgot to get round to it"! Are you really surprised they are getting stroppy?

Can they add an "admin charge". Possibly not but that can take you to court and cost you a good deal more!

Hi there

I didn't receive an overpayment of £400 into my bank account. I (unknowingly) took more holiday than I was entitled to because I left a few months before the year end, and so my holiday entitlement had to be adjusted. Therefore I owe back the paid leave taken.

I feel you may have missed the point in my post, my question was simply about the admin charge...
 
I know that they are entitled to ask for it back, this has not been questioned or complained about by me lol.
I have also not questioned a right to pay back in easy instalments. This option was clearly offered to me in my initial letter and so I have no need to question that on this forum. *They* are fine with my repayments and so I am also not questioning their 'generosity'. You don't know my financial situation, so the judgement you're displaying is really strange and inconsiderate. Again, I have not called them "stroppy" or expressed any surprise (see: my fault! & fair enough!). You have read an awful lot from things that I have not said lol!

Thanks for eventually responding to my question regarding the admin charge though! A little understanding and a lot less sass would have been so nice! 

steampowered

Paying back £10 a month is a complete waste of everybody's time.

It's a massive waste of time for whoever at the employer needs to monitor that to make sure you do it, and it's a waste of your time since you seem to forget to do it. 

Just pay back what you owe in full, and be done with it.

getmore4less

Kate_kt said:

Undervalued said:

So, by any reckoning you were overpaid by around £400 but you didn't notice? 

It is as much the employee's responsibility to ensure that their pay is correct as it is the employer's. Yes, they should have got it right but they are fully entitled to to ask for prompt repayment of any accidental overpayment, just as you would no doubt have done had it been the other way round. 

There is no automatic right to pay it back in "easy instalments" and £10 a month for three and a half years is generous on their part to say the least! If they took you to court you would be ordered to pay at a rate the judge decided you could afford, which in most cases would be significantly more that £10 a month. You would also have pay their court fee. If you defaulted on that they could take enforcement action and the considerable costs of that would be added to the debt.

You have already failed to honour the agreement you made to start paying £10 when you "forgot to get round to it"! Are you really surprised they are getting stroppy?

Can they add an "admin charge". Possibly not but that can take you to court and cost you a good deal more!

Hi there

I didn't receive an overpayment of £400 into my bank account. I (unknowingly) took more holiday than I was entitled to because I left a few months before the year end, and so my holiday entitlement had to be adjusted. Therefore I owe back the paid leave taken.
...........

Does your contract have the correct terms to allow for that claw back  of holiday pay in excess of accrued for part year service?

They are not entitled to the refund without it.

dollywops

Most companies will have a clause in their contract about authority to deduct monies owing from pay.  
If you have offered £10 per month, then set up a standing order and stick to it.  If you can pay more, then fine.  Just pay what you owe, and don't pay the admin charge.

Kate_kt

steampowered said:

Paying back £10 a month is a complete waste of everybody's time.

It's a massive waste of time for whoever at the employer needs to monitor that to make sure you do it, and it's a waste of your time since you seem to forget to do it. 

Just pay back what you owe in full, and be done with it.

It's what I can afford to commit to around other commitments. If and when I'm in the position to commit to more, I will, and will add on lump sums when I can. I forgot to set up a standing order, now I have. Didn't come here to ask for opinions on my financial situation and choices during a global pandemic & recession, but thank you for your advice anyway

Kate_kt

getmore4less said:

Kate_kt said:

Undervalued said:

So, by any reckoning you were overpaid by around £400 but you didn't notice? 

It is as much the employee's responsibility to ensure that their pay is correct as it is the employer's. Yes, they should have got it right but they are fully entitled to to ask for prompt repayment of any accidental overpayment, just as you would no doubt have done had it been the other way round. 

There is no automatic right to pay it back in "easy instalments" and £10 a month for three and a half years is generous on their part to say the least! If they took you to court you would be ordered to pay at a rate the judge decided you could afford, which in most cases would be significantly more that £10 a month. You would also have pay their court fee. If you defaulted on that they could take enforcement action and the considerable costs of that would be added to the debt.

You have already failed to honour the agreement you made to start paying £10 when you "forgot to get round to it"! Are you really surprised they are getting stroppy?

Can they add an "admin charge". Possibly not but that can take you to court and cost you a good deal more!

Hi there

I didn't receive an overpayment of £400 into my bank account. I (unknowingly) took more holiday than I was entitled to because I left a few months before the year end, and so my holiday entitlement had to be adjusted. Therefore I owe back the paid leave taken.
...........

Does your contract have the correct terms to allow for that claw back  of holiday pay in excess of accrued for part year service?

They are not entitled to the refund without it.

Hey! 
Thanks a lot for your response!
I actually have no idea. It's been a year and a half since I left now. Do you think it's worth asking for a copy of my contract? I had a difficult time with my contract whilst there tbh. 

Kate_kt

dollywops said:

Most companies will have a clause in their contract about authority to deduct monies owing from pay.  
If you have offered £10 per month, then set up a standing order and stick to it.  If you can pay more, then fine.  Just pay what you owe, and don't pay the admin charge.

I wish it were the case that the money could have just been deducted from my pay! But in this situation it seems the overpayment was a result of me leaving, so the issue didn't exist when I was there. Unfortunately! 

Thank you so much for your response! Yes I plan to pay more whenever I can! I appreciate the advice