Employee leaving work early and not meeting minimum contract hours

[Rustyfeet]

Hi all,
I wouldn't normally ask for advice on here but at this time of year all offices are closing!

We have an employee salaried to work a minimum of 40 hours a week. I went to do payroll for our weekly paid staff today and I added said employees hours up and seen that they are working 7 hours less a week.

I queried this and she point blank ignored this and was talking about something else in the message. She is supposed to be the manager of the place (hospitality) and sets up the rotas. I have now gone and collected all past rotas and she has done this for the last 3 weeks since moving from 0 hours to a salary. I worked with her to make the salary work and even agreed to pay a little more as she wants to apply for a mortgage as long as she worked the 40 hours minium.

Where do I stand legally regarding her pay? I have checked online but it all seems to be from an emplpyee point of view.

Tia

Re HR yes I need to sort this out. We are a small business. We have 4 places and about 40 staff. This has all happened quite quickly in concession of each other and actually wasn't what I planned. But that's a story for another day!
Don't jump out of the frying pan and into the fire. Do you have a plan / cover for when she goes? Do you have a better-worded contract for the replacement? Etc, etc.

You can give notice any time; it doesn't have to be the first / last day of the month.

This. She’s committing a crime, obtaining pecuniary advantage. As an aside I’d use this as an opportunity to brush up on basic employment law, as for demoting her, thats basically telling her and the other staff it’s ok to steal as long as you are a manager.

Yes I am going to bring back in our old manager. She was amazing! She only left because she had to go back home to care for her mum. But I spoke to her the other day and she's keen to come back in 2 weeks time. So a replacement isn't an issue.

The really crap thing is, the lady I want to sack is ridiculously good with customers! She's very popular with them and gets lots of good reviews in. Which is how I caught her out working elsewhere. Someone said they thought they recognised her from X so I looked up and there where 4 new reviews in the last 2 days with her name in.

Thank you everyone for your help. Lots of info and things to soak in and do. Which i will start sorting today.

Hoping to sell up soon. I'm so over all of these things! We want to go back to our old job and it being just the 2 of us again! People are hard work and the industry is slowly dieing a slow death!

Well that's your balance in your meeting: you are fantastic with customers, however...

I work in HR. Just dismiss. She's only with you temporarily for the mortgage offer. You know this, it's why she's not taking it seriously. She's not even picking up the phone to you!

If you’re her manager start managing her instead of letting her rule the roost.

Don’t let her ignore you. Issue an instruction she is to attend a meeting with you to discuss her attendance, time keeping, performance and overpayment.

then consider disciplinary action/clawing back the overpaid wages

she’s taking the piss and you are letting her

I don't think i put it in my other messages
But she's been with us 3 months. (2 on a zero hours basis) and coming to the end of the 1st month on salary. So I am nipping it in the bud! It's only just come to my attention in the last week

Everything has been taken on board. Thank you again

Op you know that there are companies who provide HR services to small businesses?

I suggest you get some proper advice before you end up with any unfair dismissal on your hands.

The employee has no employment rights, she's only been there 3 months.

Hoping to sell up soon.
Are you selling as a 'going concern' - that means that the new person will take over everything including the staff. If so then what contracts you do / don't have in place will be quite important (for staff and all sorts of other things, too).
Like I say, have a plan. Don't wing it.

So sack her.

She has fuck all "rights".

If you havent sacked her by lunchtime, you may as well stop posting updates and drip feeding because you clearly have no clue how to manage.

If you had nipped it in the bud as you claimed, you should have posted by now that she has been sacked. But you havent.

If she has carried on working and you have been paying her in accordance with the contract terms, then the assumption is that the contract is binding.

What's your break situation? "I work a 40-hour week" as a colloquial way of people describing a working week often means they have more like 37.5 in a contract. If you want someone to work 40 hours then that means you want them onsite for 42.5 or 45 depending on how long they take for lunch, right?

Be specific about what working pattern you want them to do.

Examples
35 hours: 9-5 with an hour for lunch
37.5 hours: 9-5 with half an hour for lunch, 9-5.30 with an hour for lunch
40 hours: 9-5.30 with half an hour for lunch
Etc

www.calculatorsoup.com/calculators/time/work-hours-calculator.php

You can sack her without even giving a reason with that short amount of service. Which is shit for decent workers with shit employers (which are rife in hospitality, especially the big chains) but helps you out here.

I think it's worked in your favour that she doesn't speak on the phone- this means that you have a thorough paper trail! I would screenshot all of the messages.

If she hasn't signed her contract, you can pay her for hours worked.

@HelplessSoul I was asking for advice before doing something... I only posted last night and she's not in to be able to sack her.

Trying to be fair and not go about it the wrong way actually. Otherwise I would be thrown in with the other hospitality bosses someone else mentioned.

Either way I can't win.

If she is salaried you need to pay her.

and then start a disciplinary investigation into her hours.

You have said you plan to give her notice? @rustyfeet

Dows she have less than 2 years service?

you can’t just dismiss her if she has worked with you for more than 2 years. You’d have to either follow your disciplinary procedures or make her redundant

That's unnecessarily harsh on the OP. They aren't drip feeding, just responding to varous questions, they've also been open about their HR inexperience.

More important does she deliver in terms of her work? The hours she actually work are less important if the business is prospering.

If she has been there less than 2 years you can dismiss her.

@Greyrockin thank you. I'm ignoring them now. Hope they don't work in HR with the way they communicate. Geez.

I'm leaving this thread now before I get a pile on.

Thank you for all the advice. It is appreciated. It's the first we have had this problem and we have been in the industry for 5 years. We normally have emplpyed very hard working and loyal/respectful staff and we do our best to be fair and help our employees in many ways. This was a first for us. Hence why I was asking on here!

Sorry if anything appeared as a drop feed. I'm flat out exhausted and just trying to do the right thing

For those who celebrate, merry Christmas and for those that don't I hope you have a lovely relaxing break.