Please help me - this is grossly unfair and I don't know what to do!!

[Amandella]

I've been training to be a teacher (better not post the employer on here I guess) for a charity who provides training for people. This is a big organisation and well known and well respected. I have been undertaking an HND for about 4 years now part time as I have two kids and I expect to fully qualify in about 6 months or so. In the meantime, this charity decided to review all of its pay structures throughout the country and to basically put everyone on the same salary bands which are dependent upon how many years you have worked. I live in an area of London where the pay rates were historically higher than elsewhere - about 15 to 20% highter - and I started the training believing that when I qualified, I would be on the same rate. When the new pay rates came in, we (2 x students) queried the new rate, saying it was unfair and that we should be on the same rate as our colleagues. The charity finally agreed to protect the existing rate for newly qualified teachers provided we began teaching before a certain date - which I did. Anyway, I was waiting to be paid for my first classes and lo and behold, I'd been paid at the lower national rate. So I complained, and they agreed that I should have been paid at the protected rate (which they'd agreed) so they would rectify it HOWEVER THEN THE BOMBSHELL. They said that what the original memo had meant was that we would go onto the first pay band rate (which is higher in my borough I would be paid this rate (first year rate) for a total of 3 years and then go on to a slightly higher rate in line with the rest of the country. So, this means that whilst all my colleagues are earning the higher London rate, I will be the ONLY one earning the new rates and not the London rates....for ever more. So, whilst I wallow on the lower rate, my colleagues are earning about £12 per hour MORE THAN ME and do exactly the same job!!! I can't believe that I am the only person in my entire area who is being treated like this and the charity are REFUSING to budge. I feel like walking away but I've spent hundreds or hours studying and believing I was going to earn the same as everyone else but I'm not. WHAT ON EARTH CAN I DO ABOUT THIS??? Please help!!!

Amandella I can help you although I will have to come back to it later. In the meantime, is there anyway you can explain it a bit further? I don't really understand what you're saying tbh!

Are you saying that you are being paid less than colleagues who are doing the same job as you, same level of experience, same area, same everything? And if so, why is that, what reason have you been given?

Have another bash at explaining it if you can, then I'll come back and have another read a bit later on.

How long have you actually been an employee? Did the changes come in whilst you were still effectively a student or an employee?

Do you have any written agreements with them from when you first started training which talk about future earnings?

Could you apply for other jobs with other employers once you have the qualification, or are you forced to work for them for a time because they sponsored your training?

Are you actually an employee or a student?

We are not required to sign a contract until after we have qualified. They only introduced written contracts to staff this year as previously everyone was self employed (and the majority still are). I haven't seen a contract so I guess in that way I'm not technically an employee. The thing is that they are paying for my training and as part of that training I have to teach one course without pay (done) and then 2 x courses which will be paid and are assessed to go towards by HND. I am starting my second course tonight. The changes came into play earlier this year.

Amandella-

Am I right in thinking this:

• Your employer is standardising pay rates across the country. You have just discovered that this only applies to new joiners, not existing employeees. Existing employees will retain the separate payscales based on region which they currently have.

• When you were told of the plans, you asked for your rate to be based on the old London weightings. The employer agreed, but only for 3 years.

• This means that you will get London weighting for three years and then go onto a standard national pay scale. This will leave you worse off than employees in other parts of the country in real terms(because of the increased cost of living in London) and worse of in actual terms than people who joined in the London office just before you (because they will be on the more favourable London scale).

Is that correct? If so, I am afraid that there is very little you can do. There is no right it law to be paid fairly for your work, or for your employer to take into account regional differences in living cost.

The only options I can think of are:

1. If you were given a contractual committment to the pay scale - for example if it was attached to your offer letter. If that's the case, you might be able to enforce the old terms.

1. At a real push, you could try equal pay - i.e. that there are men doing the same job as you and being paid more BUT an employer can defend this claim by showing that there is a business related reason which is unrelated to sex and justifies the change. A nationwide change in pay scale probably falls within this. I mean, it's not about gender is it, it's about them putting in a new policy that's unfair on Londoners.

Are there any other job opportunities to do this type of work? TBH, if the money's that bad, I would be inclined to start looking ready for when the three years run out

flowerybeanbag......here goes - sorry it's SO long and confusing.

The charity employs teachers to run classes from home (you may even guess who they are but we deal with giving birth!!)

Anyway, I was asked if interested in becoming a teacher 4 years ago. I agreed and was interviewed by a tutor and the charity agreed to fund my training. I have to attend tutorials once a month at their head office and part of the training when you are far enough down the line is to actually teach 3 full courses - one of which is done for free and the second and third are paid for at what is known as the student rate. You then, when qualified, go on to Band A rate and work your way up the scales to Band E (the top band). The only contract I had to sign was with the charity regarding the training and agreeing to do a certain number of hours when qualified in return for them paying for 80% of it. There is no mention of salary scales etc as I believe it was a generic contract applicable to all students country wide.

At that point, there were no contracts of employment directly with the charity but they have subsequently (in the past year or so) introduced them but only for qualified teachers - I'm not expected to sign anything until after I've completed my course, even though I do have to teach clients.

Some time late last year there was a change of management and they decided to get everyone on the same pay bands because there were so many disparities across the country. This seemed fair until we discovered, in my area, that our pay rates were well above most others and historically all teachers in my area have been following these pay bands and obviously didn't want to take a drop in salary. This would have meant between a 20 and 30% drop in salary for most teachers and so the national bands to which most staff adhere are well below national average. At the time that I undertook to do the training, I did so believing that I would simply go on to the local pay bands as had historically been the case for over 40 years. There ensued discussion with head office about this and eventually they sent a very brief memo, which is (reading it now) not particularly clear. However, it did seem to all of us to confirm that for students in my area, who were about to enter the bands and about to qualify, that we would be protected and able to go onto the old (higher) local rates provided that we taught before Sept this year. So, I made sure that I taught well before September and thought I'd just slot onto the local bands. However, they are now saying (and this was not mentioned anywhere in their memo) that what they had meant was that I would go onto the first Band A when I qualified but because this rate is significantly higher than the national Bands A and B, I would have to stay on Band A for 3 years until the national rate caught up with me and then I could go up the NATIONAL bands. This is blatently unfair as the other teachers in my area are all on the original local bands and are going up those! There is one other student who qualified before me (about 4 months ago) and even she is now going up the local bands and not the national ones.
The excuse they are saying is that they need to get everyone on the same salaries eventually but this is clearly NOT the case as the others in my area will always be on a higher salary than I can ever achieve because most of them are on the top Band E which is now frozen and is WAY above the top Band E nationwide... so whatever I do even if I did reach the top Band E, I would always be at least 30% less pay than them...

I hope this clarifies....sorry it's soo long.

Ribenaberry - I think you are probably right. I understand that there's no duty on them to pay fairly etc... but you would think that a charity (and by the way, a charity which expects people to do an awful lot of voluntary work for free!!)... would feel the inequity in this decision, particularly as I appear to be the only one country wide who is affected by this!

I think I realise I have no leg to stand on but I am so frustrated by the unfairness of it all!!!

But you won't be the only one affected by this Amandella. You are simply the first one affected by it. You will actually be earning more than other people doing the same thing in the same region if they start after you, for the first 3 years.

Your options I would say are to consider whether you wish to do the job for the rate of pay being offered, and if not, then to look elsewhere for other work. Same as most people in employment really.

I see.

Well in that case it's frustrating and seems unfair, but actually they have a point, they do need to get everyone on the same scale eventually, and that means at some point drawing the line in those places that were historically paid higher than elsewhere. Unfortunately for you, you came at the point they were drawing the line.

You say that total equality will never be the case, as you have colleagues on the top band which is frozen but higher than the new top band. Well they'll retire eventually. The easiest and least disruptive way of harmonising salaries in circumstances like these is to start at the bottom and let it (very) gradually filter though. So when they say 'eventually', they really mean eventually!

You say the charity is refusing to budge, but they have to draw the line somewhere, and if they move it for you, what's to stop the next person behind you making the same complaint?

It's unfair but it's life. Similar things happen all the time, particularly with pension schemes at the moment. New starters in loads of different organisations can no longer benefit from lovely final salary pension schemes that their colleagues have. In your circumstances, it sounds as though this exercise urgently needed to be done as it sounds as though there was a lot of disparity and unfairness in the existing arrangements.

flowerybeanbag - thank you. Yes, I do understand that they have to do this. I do realise that it's a sensible business decision. However, I guess what I'm most angry about is that I did query way back whether I'd stay on the area rates and they didn't answer me. I then asked verbally in a meeting and was told that I would stay on the rates... this was witnessed by several people but the person who said it, now denies it...

So frustrating and particularly since I've spent 4 years working my socks off to get this qualification which I am so near to getting and if I do decide to go elsewhere it will be quite difficult to find a role outside of this organisation as they seem to have the market sown up...

Could you launch something on your own?

If you work for who I think you work for they are nowhere near maximising the potential market. I tried to get on a class when I was 12 weeks pregnant and was put on a waiting list. I'm pretty sure there would be a demand, particularly if you were able to be flexible about class times.

Amandella I don't mean to sound unsympathetic, so I am sorry if I do. It's only natural to view things from one's own perspective and you'd have to be a saint indeed not to be a bit p'd off in your circumstances.

This kind of exercise is a thankless task though, it really is. Whenever there's any kind of review of a salary structure, job evaluation exercise or similar, everyone always thinks their job should be worth more. No one ever thinks they are paid too much. And no one is ever happy. Those who end up with an increase think 'About time too', or 'Well it should have been more, they compared me to X when I think I am Y'. Those who don't get an increase are huffy and suspicious of the methods used, and those who get their salaries frozen are most displeased.

Agree with llareggub, go it alone or with colleagues if you can, make the most of the training you have.