overpaid by work - what to do

[bigyellowbowl]

Longstanding issues with work over pay. They owed me £500 from miscalculated pay and it turns out I've been paid back the correction twice.

For back story, employer was horrible. utterly fastidious, and expected (and generally got) 100% accuracy from employees, yet made mistakes every single month with pay/holiday etc. I stopped mentioning their mistakes after the first couple of times because they so shitty about it and it was only because I was leaving that I dared to mention the £500 (a new, totally different payroll issue to the ones I spotted every month).

I got let go in a horrible way so definately clouding my judgement as to whether I should tell them about their lastest error or just put it somewhere safe until they notice.

I’d keep it! Leave it sitting in the bank for a few weeks but would I tell them? Hell no!!!
If you hadn’t Listed all the problems I may have said differently but they have messed your pay about so much and were perfectly happy to keep you waiting for the 500 they owed you so don’t give it a second thought 😉

If they have digitally amended your pay slip but not contacted you I'd hold fire. Someone somewhere might be matching up payments against pay slips. Have you tried to calculate all the other errors?

It sounds like they have very little clue about payroll really!

I work in payroll and they will reconcile all payments going out so I would be honest.
As nice as it would be I would look at it as a way of good karma and not worrying for months if they’re gonna ask for it back (which they can do)

Likewise if the bank paid it into your account kind of situation.

Regardless of how awful you feel they were, morally there's no right way of doing the wrong thing.

If they contact you, just say you want a full audit of all your payslips as you assumed it was a correction of the many errors they have done while you worked for them.

I have no sympathy with companies that pay underqualified, incompetent people to do their payroll to save paying for someone who actually knows what they are doing.i think accountancy servicesused to do a lot of payroll work as it was complicated dealing with HMRC and sending the stuff off to the banks for BACS payments. Now with online banking and HMRC slightly more accessible with real time submissions more companies are doing it inhouse to save accountancy fees but it's causing major issues. Just because Julie manages the PTA finances and has Internet banking herself doesn't mean she can run a payroll!

Still totally torn tbh. I am usually a very honest person I promise, plus I will hopefully need a reference from them one day once a job application is succesful.

But... they have been totally incompetant on all matters payroll and HR and I had to push for this £500 in the first place. The first 2 times I flagged it, was told I was the one who had made the mistake. I had to do the calculations to 'prove' it, despite it not being that complicted to understand.

The other thing is that I really needed the money when I first asked for it and was told I was mistaken. I ended up scraping the money together and borrowing from various sources. It's all paid back now but was massively stressful at the time. This meant it was doubly upsetting when I had another look and realised I was right after all.

I also now cannot see how my initial correction was calculated as the paysip has since been edited and I'm worried about a whole new can of worms being opened involving. p60 / p45 etc.

Send them an email telling them of the mistake and put the money in a savings account in case they do act on it and ask for it back.

When you get your P60 for the end of the 2020/21 tax year, check the amounts against an internet tax calculator to make sure you've paid the right amount of tax and what they've actually paid you is the same as what they've reported to HMRC.

Just put it in your savings and ignore it. Their problem, their responsibility to contact you and fix it.

The best thing to do (as many have said) is to keep quiet, but don't spend it. If they ask for it back you will need to give it to them. Personally I'd put it in premium bonds, that way you might get a big payout but the money is safe.

You won't get into trouble for not reporting it. You can only get in trouble if they realise their mistake and you refuse or are unable to return it. £500 is neither here nor there in the grand scheme of things, yes you hear stories about people being convicted for fraud but that is when they've been overpaid by thousands and have quickly gone on a spending spree.

The other alternative is for you to contact them. Don't tell them exactly what is wrong, just email them querying whether your pay is correct and that you didn't receive the amount you expected.

If it was in the last financial year then it will be lost in the system.

Say nothing. They won't chase it.

Say nothing. It’s a bonus. Don’t spend it for a while incase they ask for it back. Just say you didn’t realise as it changes all the time due to errors.

I've always been honest when it comes to pay. I always check and query so if I got a large overpayment my boss would know I'd deliberately kept quiet though. I did query one large overpayment one time.

On plus side my honesty has got me pay rises and a promotion as she knows she can trust me. However my situation is a little different as still employed there.

keep all the paperwork and ringfence the money where you can't touch it . , and plead ignorance if they catch up with it . Usually I would say come clean , but in this case they would probably miscalculate and you would end up with more stress .

I would tell them. That way I have nothing to worry about. Also there is something to be said for a clear conscience.

Keep it. Fuck em.
My old work paid me for a whole month when I left even though I'd left in the middle of a pay cycle. I genuinely didn't notice until HR emailed me (quite aggressively) about it. It was their mistake and incompetence – my manager was supposed to fill in a form saying when my leaving date was and hadn't, so the fact of my leaving hadn't been registered with Finance. But I'd had an exit interview with HR, so they obviously knew I was leaving and hadn't thought to flag it with Finance or ask my boss for this form.
If their email had been apologetic rather than officious I might have felt differently.
They huffed a bit more and then gave up.

Well they sound totally incompetent. To DT least ‘show’ that you attempted to raise it with them old send a really bland email saying ‘Hi ex boss, from my calculations it looks like I could have been paid incorrectly, please call me to discuss’ and see what they do. If they’re as incompetent as they sound you’ll probably never hear from them. Put the money to one side.

I'd tell them but I'd be annoyed. OP, I suspect the reason you are asking is because you don't want to tell them. 😁. These types of thread are never started by people who are intending to pay the money back.

Haven't RTFT. They can try claim it back from you when they realise.

For quite large amounts I had an ex colleague who in error was paid relocation expenses both by the business unit he was locating from and to. In total this came to 15k of allowances he should not have received. He quite deliberately said nothing, and eventually was caught. He was sacked, prosecuted, and somewhat unusually finished up with a short jail sentence. I would declare the overpayment and ask what they want to do. The ball is in their caught to ask for a return.

@HomeSliceKnowsBest

Keep it. Fuck 'em. They'd be treating me to a Mulberry bag OP .

You won’t get much of a Mulberry bag for 500 quid.

I can’t believe the number of dishonest people on here who think it’s ok to keep the money. How shit the employer is, is totally irrelevant. It’s about having integrity.

I agree with @Jesusmaryjosephandthecamel -@bigyellowbowl you can't keep the money, they might have been awful employers but do you want to be as morally dubious as they are? I'll admit I might not be as honest if it were 20 quid- and I'd probably not even notice that myself. But £500 is a lot of money and morally would be bad. Also would be stupid to end up in trouble yourself over it.