Is it legal to work 40 hours for no pay? And 'Pakistanis' don't count

[Namechangearoonie123]

16 year old has worked 40 hours this week 'commission only'. Been dropped off in local areas to make appointments for a salesperson to call and give quotes for windows.

40 hours in the heat, today she visited over 100 homes. No escape as they were picked up and dropped off miles away and it got later and later they were picked up.

I've searched all over the net and got conflicting info.

1. It seems to say that it is legal providing it doesn't come to less than minimum wage. If it does the difference must be made up.

1. The conflicting info is that it can be 'commission only' with no pay if they're self employed.

I don't know what the truth is, does anyone know the actual answer?

And 'Pakistanis don't count' - she made one appointment on the first day to be told today that it 'doesn't count as they were Pakis' and 'no Asians count'

It cannot possibly be legal to have 16 year olds walking 40 hours in this heat to knock on 400 plus doors for no money, can it?

The revenue have very strict rules about what self-employment constitutes. I would imagine what's happening here is no-one ever earns enough to properly register/complete a tax return, so the company never really flags up. So what I would do tomorrow is phone the IR up and tell them everything you've told us, as this shower are definitely operating on the fringes of tax regulations. It might not be your call that triggers an investigation, it might be the next one, or the next one, or the one after that. By if no-one calls...

I will definitely phone the revenue

Publicising this is not an option. The company deliberately recruited the most vulnerable members of the huge group they interviewed.

They took the ones in foster care who had no previous work experience first. And they took no adults on.

The company deliberately recruited the most vulnerable members of the huge group they interviewed. They took the ones in foster care who had no previous work experience first.

Nasty. Want to name them again?

The job itself isn't illegal. I used to work for a company one of the teams did the exact same role. I worked for Anglian and Apple home improvements but I did telesales with has an hourly wage, the foot canvassers didn't. They have a much higher commission rate. I would advise anyone to not work for these sorts of companies. Give her pocket money so she doesn't have to do an exploitative job.

She has plenty of pocket money

Yes, I said they had to be paid minimum wage. I assumed they were employed by the double glazing company from your description. If they are self employed it is a different matter.

Can 16 year olds actually legally work that many hours

16 & 17 year olds cannot normally work more than 8 hours a day or 40 hour a week. There is no opt out so, unlike older employees, they can't work longer even if they want to. However, this will again hinge on whether they are employees or self employed contractors.

I also assumed she was employed by them given that she can't work for anyone else during that time as they drop them off in different areas.

It didn't occur to me til after she got back yesterday that the company might have told them they were self employed. I haven't seen a contract yet.

Thanks prh

Thank you for all your advice

I contacted Acas who said that it was likely it was within the law if not the spirit of the law as they didn't really have control over their working day.

Hmrc were not interested as if there was not enough business to generate tax due then it had nothing to do with them.

I've got legal cover with my home insurance and even though they weren't employment law specialists the woman said that it was unlikely it fell outside the law.

I've also seen her contract and it certainly describes her as a self employed canvasser.

The only option left is publicity which is not possible or desirable for her.

So this is a wrong I cannot right for her but thanks all of you for providing support and advice

I'm really surprised that she can enter into a contract at her age.

Did you know she was job searching? Did you know she had applied for this job? If you knew all that then surely you were assuming she could enter and employment contract? Otherwise why let her do all that if you thought she couldnt legally work?

One of her friends took her in to the workplace one day down the town, she was taken on immediately.

I would love to have stopped her but I don't have the power to do that, the first thing I did when she went in the next day for training was call her social worker.

And she said it was fine. She's under a care order so they make the decisions.

I talked to her a lot about how it looked exploitative and dodgy to me but she wanted a lot of extra money.

I might be being dense and you've said but which company is it?
All of the big home improvement companies work this way. Anglian, Everest, Zenith, apple, safestyle. They all do it.

It's Zenith, and yes you're right it seems there's a lot of immoral practice in this area.

Agree with the advice you've had - it's probably (just) within the boundaries of the law but what a dreadful way to do business.