Repaying overpayment of wages , now passed to debt collection agency , help please !

[Lilyloo]

My partner left his previous job last June.
This was a shambles and he never signed his leaving papers (manager brought someone elses with similair name).
He then got full wage following his departure. He immediately informed them and ask they recalculate (he was owed gardening leave , holidays etc)
They then paid him the following month again he contacted them.
We then recieve letter asking for full repayment of two month wages.
He rings and tries to get breakdown. He is advised that they will be taking the full amount out of his bank account in 2 days (he worked for the bank).
He then spends all day trying to speak to his ex manager etc but couldn't get it resolved so had to close the account as taking the full amount would have sent us overdrawn. Forcing us to move all our dd's and in short a nightmare.
They then send threatening letter stating they will pass debt on.
We respond again via special delivery letter at the end of Jan this year stating we will pay what we owe when they send us breakdown including hols etc.
Haven't heard anything until today when we get letter from Tamarisk debt management again asking for full payment within 7 days
Please can anyone help , what should we do from here tia

[Skegness]

Have you got the money to pay? Might be easiest way out.

Speak to a lawyer or Citizen's Advice.

[Lilyloo]

Thanks skegness , we have one month wage set aside as we believe that is what he roughly owes. Am not really happy to pay them money we don't owe them tbh. Am more annoyed they have escalated this whilst ignoring what i see as a reasonable request , we have always stated we intend to pay what we owe.

Will ring CAB i guess.

[Lilyloo]

Anyone ?

[belledechocolatefluffybunny]

You can contact the collections agency and state that you are disputing the amount, they will then put this on hold. He needs to put everything in writing and ask again for a breakdown of the wages paid, he should however have a payslip for these dates. The CAB are really helpful and have the ability to contact the bank/collections agency on your behalf once you have given them permission.

[belledechocolatefluffybunny]

The collections agency are more then likely part of the bank by the way, they are often in the same building.

[LoveBeingAHungParliament]

From the Banks POV closing the account and withdrawing the funds it says belongs to them was always going to result in this. (can you tell where i used to work)

Can he call the Payroll department as they should be able to help work this out, it won't be the first time they have heard it. Failing that a letter to the chief exec normally gets all banking problems resolved very quickly, even ex employee ones, especially when concerning the failing of current managers.

[cantcarryon]

Just because they are your employer DOES NOT give this bank the legal right to take money out of your account without your permission. Any attempt to do so must be a blatant breach of the banking code. You should report them for trying to do this.

They have acted completely unreasonably by failing to give you a proper breakdown of your final pay due. And demanding the overpayment back all at once is also unreasonable. If it is established that there was an overpayment they should allow you to pay it back in instalments. Passing this to a debt collecting agency amounts to extortion and harassment.

If they ever tried to take any legal action to recover this it would be thrown out because they have not even provided evidence of the debt and, in cases of overpayment of wages they would be required to allow you to pay it back in instalments as it is quite possible that you could have spent it without realising it was incorrect.

I think you should speak to CAB to get advice on how to get this resolved.

[flowerybeanbag]

By cantcarryon Tue 11-May-10 18:14:30
"in cases of overpayment of wages they would be required to allow you to pay it back in instalments"

That's not the case unfortunately, if it's an overpayment it can be deducted in one go straightaway, there's no requirement to allow instalments. In cases where it was overpayment of a large amount that might reasonably not have been noticed by the employee, most employers would allow instalments or similar, but in any case, the OPs partner made it clear straightaway he knew it was not correct. Having said that, of course overpayments deducted straightaway would mean from future salary payments owed to the employee, not accessing someone's personal bank account which sounds outrageous.

OP I'm not saying the employer has behaved reasonably, clearly he should have had some kind of paperwork outlining what his final pay should have been, however it seems possible to me that the reason they have become so aggressive is because your partner has paid back nothing at all in almost a year.

I'd be inclined to work out as closely as you can how much you think he owes. I'm not sure why he'd be owed gardening leave money, gardening leave is just where the employer asks the employee not to come into work at a time when they are still employed, so as long as he was paid up to and including his final day of employment that shouldn't be an issue.

Either way, whether he was on gardening leave or not, his final payment would usually have been for however many working days he was employed in June last year, plus however many days holiday he had accrued and not taken. A day's pay is usually 1/260th of annual salary so if you divide his salary by 260 then multiply by working days employed in June plus holiday days owed, that should give you a gross total before tax.

Obviously it won't be exact at all, as there is tax involved etc but from that you ought to be able to pin down a rough amount your partner thinks he owes, and really, I think you should pay that in a cheque and include a letter saying that this is the amount you believe you owe and if they believe you owe any more they will need to specify in detail.

I'm sure there are legal ins and outs with debt recovery and dispute of amounts, which I know nothing about, so I agree you should talk it through with the CAB first, and they may give you very different advice. It just occurred to me though that if you'd paid what you thought you owed therefore prompting them to either drop it altogether or specify the difference, it may have been resolved earlier without debt collection agencies being involved.

[LoveBeingAHungParliament]

cantcarryon ~ It is generally in the contract of bank employees that if they are overpaid it can be withdrawn, and is always part of the leaving papers that are signed.

This dispute would also have the knock on effect of his P45/60 being incorrect.

I assume his gardening leave was due to going to another role/company that they consider it was not possible for him to carry on attending work? In this case there should have been no reason why his correct papers could not have been sorted out.

Don't know which bank it is, but after Tamarisk debt management seem to be linked to RBS in that case I can tell you what i have told you would be correct Generally speaking the account will have been reopened to take the money out and it will now be an overdrawn account that they are chasing you for.

[cantcarryon]

Didn't realise that LBAHP - that is actually pretty shocking, it seems bank employees are not covered by the banking code at all!

So basically the bank is taking the line of ignoring the OPs requests for information and demanding money with bullying tactics. I still think that if this ever went to a court the judge would wipe the floor with this bank as they have not produced any proof that they are actually owed this money.

Remind me never to work for a bank.

[LoveBeingAHungParliament]

From the perspective of the Bank (putting the manager aside) the op withdrew the funds and closed the account after being notified they were going to debit the money. The money will have been debited anyway therfore the account is open with an overdrawn balance and that is what is being chased not wages as such iyswim.

It is unusal to have no signed paperwork for someone who has left and a massive issue that money had been paid when it should not have been (this was due to either no paperwork OR the paperwork missing the cut off point for amendments to payroll which is usually the first week of the month), this will have been raised to area/regional managemet for explaination (unless things have changed in the last year whch i can't see as they have been getting tighter on everything).

The manager would have had to explain why there is no paperwork, if he had been my manager taking the wrong paperwork would not have been a good enough answer and he would have been instructed to get it signed urgently. Afterall the form is on the intranet and easily printed out in seconds, salary can be worked out easily and if needed a call to payroll to help.

The payroll telephone number is on his payslip. If his does decide to go to the chief exec remember to ask for a copy of his final paperwork and for an explaination of how this has happened.

[cantcarryon]

It's the fact that this bank can just dip into the OPs bank account without their permission for any reason they like that I find shocking. They should not have been able to create this overdrawn balance in the first place. An ordinary account holder has the choice over allowing money to be taken out of their account and coulf have legally blocked this. The bank still has all the usual legal remedies to recover their money if they feel they are owed it but they would have to give proof they are owed this money. Which is surely not unreasonable.

It is the fact that bank employees have to give their employer full control of their bank account with no safeguards which I feel is WRONG! Why should they be exempt from the protection of the law?

[LoveBeingAHungParliament]

Anyone who has a debit coming out of there account would have had the same thing happen, think about a cheque or debit card payment, the goods have already been taken, its also one of the reason a fraud on your acocunt whne your account details change is such a pita.

Its the paperwork that gives them permission, at the leaving interview all this shoud be explained, including what will and won't be coming in and out.

It is normally an issue if the employee is leaving wihtout proper notice and therefore the info re pay won't go through payroll before payday. ie if they are leaving with immediate effect the day before payday they will get a full months pay, doesn't help that they pay wages on the 18th of the money for the full month. iyswim?

[flowerybeanbag]

I'm sure the gardening leave was for an appropriate reason, that's not really in question. My point was that gardening leave is completely irrelevant to this dispute. Gardening leave isn't about money, it's about location, and whether the OPs partner spent all or part of his notice period on gardening leave makes no difference at all to what he is owed. Just in case that is clouding the issue slightly.

Really, only two pieces of information are important in working out what he should have been paid - his last day of employment and his outstanding holiday entitlement.

If he handed in the correct notice, which I assume he did, then obviously his last day of employment would be the end of that period, so one month from the date he handed in his notice if his notice period is a month, and so on. His employer may have the wrong date for some reason.

He would have accrued holiday up to his last day of employment but should check either his contract or handbook or whatever to see the rules about holiday when leaving mid-holiday year and/or mid-month. Sometimes you have to work a complete month to accrue holiday for that month, for example.

Understanding why or how the error could have occurred is always useful I think. His P45 will show the day they think his employment ended, so it will be clear if that's the problem - if that date is not the end of his notice period then that's where the problem has come.

Another issue to think about is, if he spent all or part of his notice period on gardening leave, are his employers working on the basis that his accrued holiday should have been taken during that time? That would be usual. Obviously here he's had no actual leaving paperwork as such, but something about gardening leave may be in his contract or a handbook, and it would often specify that outstanding holiday must be taken during any period of gardening leave. Obviously if there's nothing saying that anywhere, it would be reasonable to assume holiday would be paid on top.

All this taking money business because its a bank he worked for is outrageous I think.

[cantcarryon]

There is protection given in the case of direct debits as the perosn taking the money has to inform you in writing every time the amount of the payment varies then you have the right to cancel the direct debit immediately. They have to give you sufficient notice to cancel if you want to. If the bank still pays out by accident they are legally obliged to refund the account holder.

With a cheque or debit card payment you actively choose to make a specified payment to a specific person. And you can put a stop on a cheque or debit card payment at any time until it is released as cleared funds to the other party.

In this case the OP had to give permission for their employer to take any amount of money from their account at any time for any reason. With no right to cancel the arrangement. I cannot think of any other circumstances in which this amount of control is given to a third party over a person's bank account. It just seems very wrong that it is a requirement of working for a bank that you have to give up all legal rights to control over your own bank account.

[cantcarryon]

Yes flowery, it is the fact that this bank has effectively said they do not have to justify why they are owed the money back and are just taking it that is very wrong. Any other employer would have to give details of the overpayment. If they had done this and it was correct I think the OP is willing to pay it.

[LoveBeingAHungParliament]

Answering on my phone now so answer will be much smaller! Money being debited would always be with the full knowledge of the mid and would only happen in exceptional circumstances hence me saying their area manager will be aware, I know we gad to give an explanation to our director if we did this and the only time I have had to do it is like the eg where a mos wants to without giving notice and payroll were unable to amend payment, so full months wages would go in and overpayment would go back out again and hhis is what I would explain to the mos.

For the posters oh to have had gardening leave he probably would have been at a level to understand how this works. I would be interested to know how he has attempted to resolve this as he did withdraw the money he was overpaid and knew he had been overpaid, and it is now a year ago next month.

[cantcarryon]

Still doesn't justify refusing to set down full details of overpayment and raiding a bank account without giving proper reasons.

Are banks above the law now? No other employer would be able to get away with this.
OP has stated that employer refuses to give details of the overpayment and if they did they would pay it back. I agree with flowery that it would make sense to work out how much they think is owed and pay that back. Then they have done all they can to sort it out.

LBAHP - the point is that the employer in his case have not given any explanation for the amount they propose to take and OP says it is far too much. I am sure you would not have handled it that way, but in this case that is what happened.

You may think it is reasonable to just take what you think is owed from an employee's bank account without offering any explanation, but I don't.

If this is seen as normal practice for banks I will make sure I NEVER EVER work for one.

[LoveBeingAHungParliament]

I haven't said it was reasonable just tried to give some of my experience to try and help the op and other questions raised. I don't work there anymore, was made redundant so certainly am not trying to justify what they've done/whats happened. HIs manager fuck up, i just don't see why it hasn't been resolved before now though.

Lilyloo I have CAT if i can help further.

[cantcarryon]

Yes, sorry, i see you were not actually saying you agreed with it.

It really is alarming that banks are allowed to behave like that.

[Lilyloo]

Thanks all only just got back to this.
The gardening leave was given within his month of notice ( they are trying to claim some of this money so presume they have got wrong leaving date ) we think ? I think is down to him never being given the right leaving papers to sign.

Our last point of contact was payroll via phone who said they couldn't stop the money coming out within 2 days even though they agreed the amount was wrong. We had no choice but to close the account. They never followed this through with a revised amount though.

Haven't thought of trying chief exec but worry it may have gone too far. Will def tell him to write to them.

I agree we should have paid the second month back as we aren't disputing that and have that in an account untouched. We just wanted the final paperwork and an arrangement off them how to repay it. Neither of them have been forthcoming given they have ignored our letters. Not even sure where to send repayment to.
Lovebeing if we sent the months wage and a covering letter disputing the other do you think they would accept that and get us the breakdown ? Am worried this has escalated so far without them really making any attempt to resolve it either.

Thanks everyone for your help.

[Lilyloo]

If he has never signed any leaving papers (which he hasn't) would they still be allowed to reopen his account ?
That is absurd as this will now affect his credit rating etc surely ?

[flowerybeanbag]

What does his P45 say as his last day of employment, does it tally up with the end of his notice period?

[LoveBeingAHungParliament]

Depends how you want to play it with the debt collectors and how much longer you've got to pay it. The cheif exec will only give them 24-48hrs to go back with the full info plus all departments are targetted on these types of complaints. Would be worth knowing if the account is open or if it has been trigger another way if you do decide to go that way as you can bring in the banking code etc and complaining to the ombudsman.

[Lilyloo]

No the date on his p45 is wrong too , he has comprised a letter tonight to the DCA and the Chief Ex explaining everything and will see what comes of this. Will be sent special delivery tom.
On reading the paperwork tonight they have stated in an email that his leaving date was given to payrol at the end of Sept not when he left. (Wrong date) And if this was wrong for us to contact the manager (dp did this and was told he would be sent copy of notice etc , this never arrived). We do have papertrail , names etc so no worries there.

Would it be possible for him to have left without signing any papers ? Payroll did say he agreed to them taking any overpayment when he joined , we can't find this in his contract.

Thanks for all your help it is much appreciated .