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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to consider keeping an overpayment from work?

57 replies

jango36 · 21/04/2013 16:08

title says it all.. Was paid a few hundered extra this def was extra. Some admin person has done it in error! am I terrible for considering keeping stum?!

OP posts:
HousewifeFromHeaven · 21/04/2013 16:09

Yes you are it's not yours

McNewPants2013 · 21/04/2013 16:17

Don't do it once your employer discovers the mistake you will have to pay it back.

JamEyelid · 21/04/2013 16:18

YABU

DP got this. Left it in the bank for ages and then spent it. Two days later they contacted him and he had to pay it back like I told him they would

ilovesooty · 21/04/2013 16:20

If you're happy to be accused of fraud once the company is audited, I suppose you might not have a problem. Hmm

MrsMacFarlane · 21/04/2013 16:23

Fess up and give it back. They'll definitely ask you for it when they realise what's happened. They'll just deduct it from your next pay if you don't return it.

OrbisNonSufficit · 21/04/2013 16:24

As you know it's an overpayment, you'll have to give it back -- CAB

hellhasnofurylikeahungrywoman · 21/04/2013 16:24

Not quite sure how you could keep it, they'll discover the error and ask for it back and you will have to give it to them. So yes, YABU.

ChairOfTheBored · 21/04/2013 16:25

Guess it depends how you feel about keeping your job?

To keep it would be fraudulent, and the only honest thing to do is to tell them, and pay it back.

JerseySpud · 21/04/2013 16:25

YABU. Its a sackable offence i believe as its fraud.

1Catherine1 · 21/04/2013 16:26

I was overpaid for 6 months, genuinely didn't notice (It was my first full time job). By the time it came out I owed them a lot of money. It caused me so much stress, I was living month to month as it was.

Don't spend it!

ImpatientOne · 21/04/2013 16:27

As sooty says it is fraud so really not worth trying to keep quiet.

A colleague of mine did manage to negotiate a gradual repayment plan when this happened to her rather than it go in a lump but it will eventually have to go back...

prophylaxis · 21/04/2013 16:27

It's probably a bad idea but I've been overpaid a few times, firstly when I left my previous employer I was overpaid about £1500, I wrote to tell them about it and got a weird response, seems they didn't have a process to deal with it really, it ended up being left to my line manager, who didn't give a crap as it wasn't his money. This wasn't even some small company, it was a multi billion pound global finance company! I was treated like crap while I was there so don't feel bad about it, but if they got their act together and asked for it back tomorrow I would pay it back (I have enough in savings).

My current employer has screwed up a couple of times paying me for what was supposed to be unpaid leave, again I told them about it and they made a mess of asking for it back, offered me to pay it back in installments or all in one go I said I was happy to pay it all at once, then they never mentioned it again, and made the same mistake another time after that. Again I can pay it them back tomorrow, but I'm not chasing them about their mistake after I already told them once.

So my view is - tell them about it and offer it back, but don't waste your time chasing them about it if they muck about. But always make sure you have enough savings to pay it back if they ask for it in future.

edam · 21/04/2013 16:29

Fess up - it will be discovered eventually anyway and you will have to pay it back.

Used to be at least you could stick it in a high interest account and earn a few pennies, only there aren't any of them left with immediate access these days.

prophylaxis · 21/04/2013 16:30

Its a sackable offence i believe as its fraud.

Even if it is, there's no offence without proof of intent, the employee can simply claim they didn't realise it was an overpayment, and if there's no evidence (eg posting on facebook "I got overpaid and am going to keep it lol"), nothings ever going to come of it.

StepAwayFromTheEcclesCakes · 21/04/2013 16:37

I was overpaid for 9 years Shock queried several times for explanation as to an odd entry on the wage slip that said additional told it was ok then 9 years later in a restructure that resulted in my redundancy someone discovered it was wrong. PANIC would have been thousands to pay back but as I had queried it and line manager had the big boss instructed HR not to claim it back. salary took a bit of a drop for the last 3 months of the job before redundancy but got redundancy pay and got a new job 6 months later so a result.

CloudsAndTrees · 21/04/2013 16:41

Do you really need to ask? Hmm

SweetSeraphim · 21/04/2013 17:05

You will get found out and have to pay it back. That's the only reason that I would say YABU.

TattyDevine · 21/04/2013 17:07

I would say something, because there's a good chance the error will get picked up anyway and its an opportunity for you to show how honest and trustworthy you are as an individual.

Many years ago an employee with a similar name to me got paid my overtime. When I queried my payslip they did of course work it out and she did have to pay it back (they claw it back) and whilst she didn't get in trouble, it didn't show her in a good light at all.

AngelinaJoliesBeard · 21/04/2013 17:09

Imagine how it makes you look if you keep it and they have to ask for it back. Think long term.

ShadowStorm · 21/04/2013 17:43

YABU.

They'll notice eventually and then they'll want the money back. Better to tell them about it now so it gets sorted out sooner rather than later.

A similar thing happened to me a few years back when I was working as agency (so not entitled to holiday pay) - somehow they processed my timesheet twice so paid me once, properly, for a week I'd worked - and then paid me the same amount again the next week when I was on holiday.

They noticed pretty quickly, before I did - I think I didn't notice because both payslips showed the normal weekly pay I'd expect to get.

But, the result was that the overpaid money just got took off my next payslip. There wasn't any suggestion that I'd deliberately failed to tell them of their error, but if I'd gone and spent the money on stuff already then having the overpayment taken off the next weeks wages would have left me in a bit of a mess.

HomeEcoGnomist · 21/04/2013 17:50

Yes, YABVU

When they find out and ask for it back, you are not going up look good
In situations like this in the past, I have always questioned someone's integrity if they don't raise the mistake before they are contacted about it.
There are really very few people whose monthly pay is so complicated that they can't be expected to check their own tax code or net pay.

expatinscotland · 21/04/2013 17:52

They'll eventually catch the error and you'll need to pay it back.

ChoudeBruxelles · 21/04/2013 17:55

Tell them

Floggingmolly · 21/04/2013 18:28

They will discover it, it's just a question of when. And then you'll not only have to and it back, but they'll know you're dishonest.

How will that look?

mmmuffins · 21/04/2013 18:29

YABU

I moved internally to a less-well paid (but more interesting) position, but the company continued to pay me my previous higher salary. I didn't notice.

They noticed about 4 months in and I had to pay all the money back. I don't think there is any point in you keeping it, as surely your company will eventually do the same.

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