Pay & Conditions for 16 year old

[FestivalFoodwork]

There is a festival on locally and one of the food stall holders advertised on social media for staff to serve food. My daughter and her friend (both aged 16) applied and got the jobs.

On Thursday they started at 2pm for two hours “training” then the food van opened at 4pm. They worked until midnight including helping clean down after the van closed to customers.

Friday was also a 2pm start to prep food and again they worked until gone midnight. Today they were asked to be there at 10am with the van opening at midday and they expect to finish between midnight and 1am. Tomorrow is final day - not sure of those hours yet.

They have not been given any breaks (food stall is really busy when it’s open and there is only them and the owner). The owner told my daughter whilst daughter was chopping carrots as part of her “training” that she wouldn’t be paid for the training. I assume they will get cash at the end of the weekend - how do we best ensure they are paid correctly and fairly?

I am thinking the owner doesn’t know she is meant to give them breaks and pay them for training etc and am worried she will try and get away with not paying them fairly. They are exhausted almost to the point of tears so I really want to make sure that even though it will be minimum wage they get the right number of hours.

I did tell them to ask for a break but they are 16 and keep saying it’s just too busy and that the owner gets snappy at them so they don’t want to make her cross.

They were told minimum wage for their age when they were offered the job but hours are not pre-set as the time the van closes seems to depend on how busy it is.

There are lots of businesses out there exploiting young people.

They are not exactly enabled to do anything about it - other than walk away. It's not like they can mount employment tribunals for casual work.

Our minimum wage laws openly discriminate against them, giving them less money for the same amount of work.

There are rules (below) but so many places ignore them

https://www.acas.org.uk/young-workers-apprentices-and-work-experience
https://www.gov.uk/rest-breaks-work/young-workers

NMW is £6.40 for a 16 yo so she's got them for slave wages anyway.

I'd be working out the hours they've done for her - including the 'training' and be there to collect them at the end of the shift along with their pay so that I could challenge it if it were not correct.

I'd certainly be telling the owner that I'm very happy to report her to the Inland Revenue and Trading Standards if she doesn't cough up the whole amount. She can be a tit over ripping off teenagers if she wants the absolute shit show of hassle I would cause her over it...

Go there on the last day and speak to the owner. Make sure you get contact details aswell incase they don't pay. Add up what you think it should be so you have a figure to ask for.

Yes, I told them when I drove them there this morning to make a note on their phones notes of their start and end times. My daughter has LIfe360 on her phone so that also shows when she was on site. Just want to be ready in case she tries to not pay for training or not pay for prep before the van opens or something. Good advice here - I can also work out her hours so will do that too and have that ready to show breakdown and challenge if needs be.

Just checking - they should be paid for the “training” shouldn't they?

The owner said no to the young people - that they don't get paid for training

Which is awful but it's only 2 hours - I hope they get paid for all the other hours and they'll get a couple hundred quid

Absolutely paid for training and prep, £6.40 is an absolute bargain for the work they're doing. Lots of places try to get away with not paying for training, it's disgraceful

The owner told my daughter whilst daughter was chopping carrots as part of her “training” that she wouldn’t be paid for the training.

I would have gone in myself to speak to the owner after I’d heard this and told my daughter not to go back again if that was the case. It’s prep time, which they should be paid for. I’m not sure what you can do now.

I know it sounds harsh, but you need to let your daughter take the lead here. The life lesson of being screwed over (or hopefully, standing up and not being screwed over!) will ultimately be far more valuable than an extra £50 or whatever they might technically be owed.

Employers can say they won't pay you for mandatory training but those hours are still part of your working time and they aren't allowed to breach minimum wage legislation - so this only applies if you are paying more than minimum wage.

So I would expect them to be paid :

F - 10 hours
S - 10 hours
Sun - 14 hours
Mon - ?

So at least £215 plus Monday's wages.

Editing to add source: https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/work/pay/problems-getting-paid/#:~:text=If%20you%20haven't%20been%20paid%20for%20time%20you%20spent%20training&text=Even%20if%20your%20contract%20says,at%20least%20the%20legal%20minimum.

I don't agree with this. From what the OP has said the owner will just tell the girls to take a hike if they start making "demands" (meaning perfectly reasonable and legal requests). They need to be confronted by an adult who can remind them of the law and whom they bully or fob off.

Given absolutely nothing in writing
and owner had verbally confirmed that the training was unpaid ie owner could argue “voluntary”

As PP said, the owner must legally pay at least NMW for the hours. So if they are paying NMW they must pay the so-called training. If they pay above NMW then they must ensure that overall the wages/hours >= NMW.

Thank you all. They wanted the job and the money and I firmly believe working as as valuable as the GCSEs they’ve just taken so encouraged this. However they are young so don’t know how to stand up for themselves yet it situations like these especially when they have no clue on the spot whether not being paid or not given breaks is allowed.

They didn’t have the knowledge to know they should have walked at that point. Now they are going back as they want to be paid! If they walk now she’s not likely to pay them as they do so and they have worked very very hard for long hours.

Unfortunately we can’t go into the venue as we don’t have a ticket/wristband so I am coaching them in what I to be prepared with.

https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/work/pay/getting-paid-less-than-minimum-wage-or-living-wage/

They're working more than the number of hours legally allowed for under 18s and they also shouldn't be working after midnight.

It says this on the Acas website:

"If you earn the National Minimum Wage or close to it then your employer should pay you for time spent on mandatory training. This is because the pay received compared to the hours worked in the pay reference period might bring you below the National Minimum Wage."

However, it does talk about employment contracts and I suspect this is a cash in hand job. In which case I doubt you've got any redress about payment, training, breaks or anything. Lesson learnt I think.

I didn’t think 16 year olds are allowed to work between 2200 and 0600?

It's illegal not to allow a break if someone works 6 hours or more. I also do not think you can not pay someone for hours already worked if they leave.