I received a “nice” letter from my employer (NHS) a week ago stating that I had been overpaid the past four months and could they have 4.5K back, and “as you’ll be leaving in two months time we’re going ahead and taking it out of your Dec/Jan salary”.

I’m not disputing the overpayment (they should have notified me of a change in circumstances four month ago but didn’t…….mistake totally theirs). Can they just go ahead and alter my salary without any agreement re repayment from me? Can I not decide in the length of repayment since it was their incompetence?

Phoned payroll this afternoon to confirm they had gone ahead and taken back half in this months salary, despite any consent or communication from me.

How do I respond? ………and yes owning with bombers and weeing in shoes was in my head too!

Thanks

You’ve been overpaid by over £1,100 a month and didn’t think to question it? I guess that might be possible if that sort of money was “small change”…..

Overpaid by 4.5K, lol nice one!

Which bike did you buy?

You’ve been overpaid by over £1,100 a month and didn’t think to question it? I guess that might be possible if that sort of money was “small change”…..

….sorry should clarify; it was a planned decrease in my salary that they didn’t inform me of so there had been no change in the salary for me to notice.

Annual income cut by 13K, bummer!

Which bikes you selling?

Isn’t your more important issue the fact that they’ve unilaterally decreased your salary without you knowing anything about it? Or is there more to this than you’re telling us?

What aracer said. Sounds fishy.

Anyway look up CAB or phone the mayor to shine his TJ spotlight in the sky.

i don’t know about this bit…. Can I not decide in the length of repayment since it was their incompetence?

but i do know legally they can’t do this…we’re going ahead and taking it out of your Dec/Jan salary without your agreement i.e. signature on a piece of paper.

My Understanding is that they cannot deduct money from you without your agreement.

You have a contract with them that you work and they pay you. If they don’t pay you and you have worked they are in breech of this

Simple

so on to HR and tell them that it is not satisfactory, open grievance, kick up a stink

If you loose out from this by having direct debits bounce or incur any costs they are liable for this as well.

Blimey I thought the wiki/google masters would have been all over this. Anyway the answer seems straightforward:

http://www.adviceguide.org.uk/index/your_money/employment/faq_index_employment/faq_employment_overpayment_of_wages.htm

By law, your employer is only entitled to make certain deductions from your pay. They can deduct tax and national insurance (NI) and they can also make other deductions for which they have previously got your written consent or which are allowed in your contract of employment.

However, if there has been a genuine overpayment of your wages, your employer doesn’t need your consent to recover this. They can make a deduction from your wages without your agreement. There are some exceptions to this rule and there are special rules about deductions made from shop-worker’s pay.

http://www.adviceguide.org.uk/index/your_money/employment/rights_to_pay.htm#Isanemployerentitledtomakedeductionsfrom

There are particular deductions which an employer can make which do not have to fit into the categories listed above. These deductions are:

a deduction because the worker has been genuinely overpaid

There is also this, but relies on having the money in the first place.

http://www.theanswerbank.co.uk/Law/Question708979.html

With regard to the overpayment (assuming it to be genuine), your daughter should make it clear that she’s not simply refusing to repay the money. Deliberately ‘hanging onto’ money paid in error is a criminal offence under the provisions of the Theft Act 1968. As long as your daughter makes it clear that she can’t repay the money immediately (rather than simply refusing to do so) the matter falls solely within civil law, rather than criminal law.

That means that she’s in exactly the same position as the hundreds of thousands of people who can’t meet their credit card payments. She should offer to pay a nominal amount (of, say, a pound or two) each week. The former employer can choose to either accept the offer or to pursue the matter through the courts. If they do so, all that will happen is that a County Court Judgement will be granted, requiring your daughter to repay the money at an affordable level (which will probably still only be a pound or two each week anyway).

You could though just go sick etc…

My wife had this very thing with her employer.

Write a letter stating you dispute the amount and timescale for payment. Volunteer to pay back the amount over a more reasonable time, stating hardship if they don’t.

They are very unlikely to do something pre-emptive if you handle it carefully.

Your employer doesn’t need your consent to reclaim an overpayment. Most large employers will usually agree to reclaim over the same period it was overpaid i.e if you were overpaid for 4 months most would reclaim the payment over 4 months. But your letter says you are leaving in 2 months so I guess that’s why they are reclaiming it over 2 months?

You could try talking to them nicely and agreeing to repay over a period that extends beyond your leaving. Personally I wouldn’t hold my breath because they have no control once you have left but good luck.

TandemJeremy – Member
My Understanding is that they cannot deduct money from you without your agreement.

However, if there has been a genuine overpayment of your wages, your employer doesn’t need your consent to recover this. They can make a deduction from your wages without your agreement

You see what happens when Hull freezes over? TJ gets stuff wrong!

Man the barricades people!

Deliberately ‘hanging onto’ money paid in error is a criminal offence under the provisions of the Theft Act 1968.

Interesting…surely that would mean that those cases where bak transfers are made in error to the wrong party are capable of being sorted promptly? (i.e. coppers get payee’s details under that Act – which must trump data protection?)

I had a smaller scale issue with NHS pay & staff services, they discovered that I’d been receiving the wrong mileage allowance for a few months, could they have it back? Fair enough I thought, but they wanted it back in an unrealistically short time scale, basically between about November & end of financial year, I was down about £200 per month over that period. Only mistake I made was not arguing over how long I could repay over, as it really financially embarrassed me to be £200/month down over a 4-5 month period.

Are you leaving the NHS, or just changing employers within the NHS?

I was once paid too much overtime, £1.5k versus £150. They had to take it back over two months, as taking it all at once was too high a proportion of my salary or something. Anyway, HR made noises that sounded like it was some form of statute rules they couldn’t take it in one hit.

I suspect the two big lumpers coming out are due to you leaving in two months time. If they didn’t get it then it would probably get messy, there’ll be all sorts of considerations for tax/NI etc. on their side, it wouldn’t be as simple as you saying I’ll set up a standing order back to my old employer for 6 months to pay it back…

I assume you’ve not done £1,100 pm less work during this period? In which case, they’ve paid you too much and you’ve done too much work. Reclaim your work back over the same period!

That means you are free to go cycling every day for the next 2 months. whooohooooo!

Every day is a school day! I did not know that there was an exception from having to have consent to make deductions for overpayments.

You’re not telling us something.

cynic-al – Member

Deliberately ‘hanging onto’ money paid in error is a criminal offence under the provisions of the Theft Act 1968.

Interesting…surely that would mean that those cases where bak transfers are made in error to the wrong party are capable of being sorted promptly? (i.e. coppers get payee’s details under that Act – which must trump data protection?)

slightly o.t In theory yes, but in my limited experience in these matters what happens is that the recipient of the funds knowing they aren’t due them goes out and spend’s it all as quickly as possibe. This is arguably an intention to deprive the righful owner and to treat the money as his own and to dispose of regardless of the other’s rights giving an offence of theft. If it’s just lying in your account you can easily argue there is no intention to permannetly deprive you haven’t used the money as your own and therfore no theft offence has been commited. Hope that makes some sense

Every day is a school day! I did not know that there was an exception from having to have consent to make deductions for overpayments.

The law relating to unlawful deductions from wages does state overpayments are an exception. But for just about everything else you have to give your consent. So an employer can’t reclaim say training expenses if you leave shortly after receiving the training unless you have given your consent.

TandemJeremy – Member
Every day is a school day!

Really?

Why don’t you say this on all the occasions you are wrong?

And why do you feel the need to attack all the time? Why do you never apologise? Why do you never admit you are wrong even when you get the wrong end of the stick as you often do?

Just give it a rest Al. It tiresome

Getting the wrong end of the stick =/= being wrong.

You hold yourself out as an authority on all sorts here but are often wrong (that’s tiresome too), I’m just pointing that out.

Al, it was an unequivocal correction that TJ wasn’t in a position to argue with, he had no choice but to roll over. I’d have done the same thing…

Most large employers will usually agree to reclaim over the same period it was overpaid i.e if you were overpaid for 4 months most would reclaim the payment over 4 months

Wrote them a grumpy email and cc’d it to the local union office. Offered them solution as above to which they agreed with no argument.

Thanks all for your responses, will make xmas slightly more palatable!