Anyone able to help with this pay issue?! Talk to me like I'm a toddler

[Redhothoochycoocher]

I have recently left a job. I was only there for 6 months but, at the request of my manager, I had 2 changes to my hours while I worked there. Each time I increased my hours, my monthly pay didn't seem to increase accordingly. I looked at 'hours worked' on my payslip and this was lower than the actual hours I had worked each month. I queried this with payroll who have now replied (6 weeks later) saying that hours worked is calculated differently to how I have worked it out. Hoping someone can help bring me clarity.

I calculated how many hours I worked by adding my daily hours together (very time consuming but I worked a lot of OT and my contracted hours changed so it was the simplest way I could think to do it).

For example if I was contracted to work 25 hours a week which was spread 5 hours a day M-F. In October I would have worked 22 days x 5 hours = 110 hours that month.

I think that payroll said they take weekly contracted hrs X weeks in the year and divide by 12 months.

So in my example of October it would be 25 x 52.1428 = 1303 / 12 = 108.6 hours that month.

I don't understand how they have found a way to pay me less than the actual hours I spent working? Can anyone explain this to me like I'm 4 please?!

Ps the example really is just an example. I'm not squabbling over 2hrs pay. I think I'm owed more like 65 hours.

Because there are only 12 paydays in a year if paid monthly and not 4 weekly, so October's pay is an average for the year not 22days as another month may only have 20 working days in.

Your calculations are wrong. You are paid 1-12th of your salary a month. You're paid the same hours in say February which is a short month as you are in December which is a long month based on this.

Were you being an annual salary or was it a per hour agreement?

Ok this makes sense. Thank you

Annual salary

Actually I'm not sure if this does make sense. My payslip has 'hours worked' and pay is calculated against this not a 1/12 of annual salary.

does it state your weekly hours? I am paid this way but only my weekly hours appear in my payslip

My payslip says ' hours worked' and 'rate'

if you have the 6 months pay slips and the hours are incorrect- give them the hours you actually worked and request payment for the 65 hours unpaid

Against hours worked does it say 25 or 110?

25 means you're paid the x 52/12 version
110 means you're hourly paid

As a rule, Payroll works on 52 weeks, 260 working days per year and 21 working days per month, to average out for the shorter / longer months.

You need to know which weeks are being paid for that payment as well. There will be a schedule and cut off date for each month so that the payroll can be processed - it’s usually early in the month if you get paid late in the month for example ours is 9 November for payday on 24 November. Where it’s variable hours and timesheets it can be a month in arrears for this reason.

This is what I've done but payroll explained that I've used the wrong calculation and when they calculate it the way I explained above it comes back as less hours than I was expecting

Oh interesting. It says 110 but that might be because O/T was common?

It really depends on the job. If you were salaried then it's usually a case of being paid 1/12 of your salary each month, but there should be a mechanism for compensating you if you work more than your contracted hours.

You say your working hours were increased twice while you worked there. Was this reflected in your contract? As a PT worker, you should have had something in writing that said that normal full time hours was (for example) 37.5 hours a week but you would be paid pro rata for 16, 18, 20 hours pw according to your contract.

So then they'd pay you X/37.5 x your salary/12 each month. They may also show a rate on your pay slip but that's just maths, you're not an hourly paid worker (I have this on mine and I'm salaried).

Regarding your hours worked, either you'd have to fill in an overtime form to be paid for the extra, or what is often more usual is that you work a flexi time system and balance extra hours by taking time off or working shorter hours later on. What was the case for this job?

@Redhothoochycoocher are you being paid close to NMW? £10.42 per hour or £20k a year full time equivalent.

Is the full time salary more than £25k per year?

What are full time hours? 37 or 37.5?

If you are close to these figures they may have breached NMW.

It was over 20k FTE. I was working for the NHS so assume they weren't breaking the law 🤞

@Redhothoochycoocher trust me when I say it is very possible they inadvertently breached NMW.

It depends how much over £20k FTE you earn.

Do a couple of quick calculations
total gross pay divided by total hours. Do this a) for each wage slip and b) the total period. If any of the calculations are less than £10.42 come back and let me know.