Manager negligence cost me £700

[Hatch92]

Hey!
I left employment with my local council in March 2025, I gave the correct amount of notice and adhered to all necessary things (uniform given back etc) before leaving and was extremely professional in doing so and even with my notice letter, in the lead up to my departure I worked over time too to soften the blow and trained up one of the agency staff I had a longstanding request to employ each week (I was the only night staff without a permanent work partner) and upon my leaving left the agency member with a recommendation to be employed in my replacement - to which they did (just overall, I really wasn’t leaving on bad terms).

Fast forward to March of this year and I receive a letter dated 10 days prior to it being received giving me less than 14 calendar days to resolve an “overpayment” I had been given when I left said prior employment because they had not been made aware I had left until 10 calendar days after I had ceased employment due to the manager of the service at the time not providing my leavers paperwork (several times now this has been mentioned, acknowledged and agreed as the sole reason this has happened) however it has taken them 2 tax years and over a physical year to send me an invoice of debt due to overpayment (which actually isn’t even correct paperwork wise as it states January - this has been flagged and they have apologised and scalded whoever did the paperwork) I have argued the toss that at no point was in under the impression that I had been paid too much money as I was due holiday pay, overtime hours and other payments that would have totalled to the normal monthly payment however they’ve stayed not and “shown me their workings out” in the form of numbers on an email - I no longer have access to the gateway to view those payslips nor do I have them saved into my phone anymore as I naively believed I didn’t need them.
They have stated they caught this issue last year in March and it has for some reason take a year to provide me it.

The original handler I managed to get in touch with after scraping around over the bank holiday when this all began, was extremely disgustingly rude and simply stated that I owe the council the money and essentially tried to guilt trip the payment because by not paying the money back I am withholding from valuable funds the council use to help vulnerable people etc etc… I am currently unemployed because the company I worked for went under and recently diagnosed ADHD so overall I have not had the best start to this year and so requested & was finally allowed an extension on the 14 calendar days which has since been extended to July at my request to keep speaking to citizens advice.

I’ve essentially tried to outsource to brain power and ability to be polite because I currently do not possess the strength for either.

CAB were extremely annoyed and frustrated on my part for the utter chaos and mess around I’ve had with this issue, even in light of admitting the fault comes from a manager who is still actively working within and this was not the first issue. They drafted me an email to tweak and send and I did so, CC’ing in the service HR, service manager and the then manager alongside directly sending it to what I would class as my case manager (part of the collections team but head of that service who I was passed to after the initial rude complaints handler went on holiday and I requested someone else take over) who has been actively chasing up ALL of these people and seems just as frustrated by the situation as I am, HR never responded to me however they have offered to only waiver 50% off “in light of the immense duress caused and the negligence of the manager & the delay in providing the invoice”…
Am I wrong for trying to get this waived in full (my tweaked email was that of a waiver in full request) but the way the response that has been middle manned to me is, is that I still hold 50% of the fault here - even after evidencing their faults throughout and proving I did everything I should professionally and well before the time necessary etc.

Sorry for the long message but I cannot get to my CAB office again for 2 weeks and I am entirely unsure how to proceed and how they would assist further.

thanks in advance

[Hatch92]

I’d also like to apologise for typos throughout that stutter the pace and point of this post. It’s been a horrible 4 months and I’m just beginning to crumble all over, I’m usually brilliant with my wording - so sorry!

[efpom]

The starting point is that an employer is generally entitled to recover overpaid wages.
The employer can proceed to recover the debt in two ways a) by relying on a term of the employment contract requiring the employee to repay any overpayment of wages or b) as a debt.

If my understanding is correct the facts are:
1 The employer asserts that it discovered an overpayment of the OP’s final wages.
2 The employer has demanded repayment of that sum, a year after the OP had left
3 The employer has issued an invoice for that sum.
3 The employer has offered to settle at 50% of that sum.

My analysis:
By issuing an invoice, it seems to me that the employer proceeds to recover via route b) above i.e. as a debt.

The (former) employee’s position seems to be that there is no debt.

If I was in the employee’s shoes, I would argue that it was the employer’s incompetence which led to this state of affairs and that incompetence amounts to a fundamental breach of the implied term of mutual trust and confidence because the employer is the primary checker of a wage slip and by issuing that wage slip it confirms that the amount payable to the employee is contractually accurate.

In other words, the general rule against allowing a party to take advantage of its own breach of contract is in play.

I also add, the fact that the employer is a local authority makes no difference – in this matter it is a business and its statement to the OP that by failing to pay up, the OP was withholding "..”valuable funds the council use to help vulnerable people”" is outrageous.

[Hatch92]

Thank you, I assume that you summarise word vomited posts to make them more palatable for others? I do appreciate that.

I agree too that my position is simply that there is no debt because I correctly filled all my contractual obligations and notifications/protocols for leaving this employment position and at no point did I ever believe my final pay was incorrect, so it is my stance that it should be written off in full.

Where do I go from here?

many thanks

[efpom]

Referring to 3 of my previous post “3 The employer has offered to settle at 50% of that sum.”

I assume that offer was made in writing. If so, it is strong evidence that the employer admits that the manner in which it has dealt with the matter has, in fact, caused the OP distress and inconvenience in having to deal with its demand for repayment and has offered to compensate the OP by only requiring the OP to ‘refund’ half of the sum originally claimed.

That distress has been exacerbated by the statement made to the OP that I mentioned in my final paragraph.

If I was in the OP’s shoes I would be offering to settle at 0% of the original sum claimed + the sum of X for distress and inconvenience, noting that although it discovered the alleged overpayment at the end of financial year 1 it took no action to contact the OP until after the end of financial year 2 which alone is strong evidence of Maladministration - the OP's narrative being replete with other evidences of that.

It is for the OP to decide whether to make an offer to settle at 50%, 0% or 0% + the amount of X

[atticus]

An offer to settle for a reduced sum is not necessarily evidence of anything other than a pragmatic desire to resolve things quickly and avoid cost.

Sorry to disagree, but given the likelihood that the employer will win a case, that offer looks tempting.

[ULA]

Even though your employer has the legal right to recoup overpaid monies, you will need to agree that the amount of the overpayment is accurate. As you will have paid tax on the overpayment, you also need to ensure your former employer has taken this into account.

You say they have "shown me their workings out in the form of numbers on an email" but if you cannot access your payslips to verify this, then you will need ask them to provide these to you as you need to make sure that you are not being asked to repay a gross sum which includes tax and national insurance you have already paid to HMRC.

Ultimately your employer does have up to 6 years to pursue their claim for overpayment in the civil courts. The courts may not look favourably on the fact that there was a 12 month delay in corresponding with you about this, when they clearly discovered the issue seemingly soon after you left their employment, especially if you genuinely believed you were paid the correct amount on leaving and you have spent the money. However I would not rely on this.

They have made an offer to settle at a reduced sum which shows they would like to reach an agreement, I would suggest that you go back with a counter offer however you do need to get the full details first to verify their figures.