Just discovered I'm being paid less than my colleagues for same job. Is this legal?

[twinky]

A colleague has told me that he saw a payroll timesheet yesterday that clearly showed that he and I are being paid less per hour than other people in our shop. We are all on exactly the same level but he and I joined the company after our previous one was taken over. He queried it with the manager who said it was down to the harmonisation policy for the takeover. The . takeover happened nearly six years ago. She has basically said if I have a problem to take it up with head office but before I do so I thought I' d ask for advice here.

Provided you are not being discriminated against on the grounds of sex or similar it is perfectly legal for you to be paid at a different rate from others doing the same job.

Given what has been said about harmonisation policy, it may be the case that the company taken over had higher pay rates. Under TUPE the new company has to honour those pay rates for existing employees but there is nothing that says they have to give new employees the same pay. It may be that they are giving these employees little or nothing in the way of rises until the standard rate for the job (presumably what you are being paid) catches up.

Hmm, the problem is that while I can see that harmonisation meant a disparity at the time we are now 6 years down the line and we are still on different rates. When does that end? I' m dubious because I only found out about this by chance. Perhaps the HR dept can be specific. Thanks for your response though.

I think you will have to ask HR as they will know the background. Given the low wage nflatiob environment, it could take decades for pay inequalities from a take over to be "caught up"