My girlfriend's boss not paying her and avoiding contact

[Smasher]

Hi guys, I'm meddling in some more trouble this morning..

My girlfriend works as a social worker, she's currently working as 'Bank staff', which is a bit like a 0hr contract, except there is always work available, she just says when she can work and they offer her the shifts that they have for those days.

They still owe her for 95 hours from July and she has been asking for payment and her manager is always saying ah yes ok, wednesday, oh sorry, next Monday..... So now she has asked her manager for the contact details for the person who directly deals with paying her. Her manager at the site where she works says he has written a letter to a lady at head office, but has received no response. He gave her this lady's contact details now and said she has to contact her, as there is nothing more he can do. She has called her, but no answer and no reply to answerphone message.

She has been paid for all her shifts in August, so this is a bit baffling! She is still working there too, she loves her job, but of course, she needs to earn a living aswell..

So, I need to draft a letter to this head office lady, so hows this?


Dear miss

Myself and my site manager NAME have tried to contact you on several occasions without success in regards to payment for the following shifts shifts that I worked in August:

* LIST OF SHIFTS/DATES HERE
*
*

I spoke to my site manager NAME, who has continually given me dates by which he was told payment will be made and every time that date passed, payment was not made and he gave me another date. At this time, payment for these shifts remains outstanding. He told me that he has written to you, but as yet, you have not responded. I have tried to contact you by phone but I get no answer and you have not replied to my message.

Please let me know by reply as to when I can expect payment for these shifts. I am living in London and rent is extremely high and travel is expensive, so to lose a whole month of earnings is causing me a lot of difficulties. I love my job and I want to continue working here, so I regret that I have to write a formal letter like this, but I need to be paid, as I can't afford to wait any longer.

I look forward to your hearing from you at your earliest convenience.

Yours sincerely
U R O'verdu

[stevemLS]

Re: My girlfriend's boss not paying her and avoiding contact

I think your letter is fine.

Except it says August whereas I think you are talking about July.

Is this a local authority employer?

How does your OH claim - does she submit a timesheet to her manager to sign off or is it something clever and electronic?

[Smasher]

Re: My girlfriend's boss not paying her and avoiding contact

Actually, I don't know if they are private or local authority, I just text her to ask. She's actually at work right now.

I will also ask about how she claims. I don't think she does actually claim her shifts, she just agrees her rota, she does her shifts and they pay her into her bank, much like any other employee.

She always takes photos of the rota to keep track of what she has worked and what she gets paid, she also has paperwork & records of the things she does when she is there, so there is always a paper trail of when she was there and what she did when she was there.
I'm just saying that in case there might be any confusion on their part about whether she actually worked those shifts. She can show them the copies of the rotas and they can see that she was there and all the records of what she did.

Ah yes, I meant July, thanks!

[stevemLS]

Re: My girlfriend's boss not paying her and avoiding contact

OK, with local authorities there will be a strict cut off date to get the payroll done, for example at my place (NHS but used to work for LA) it was 5th of the month to get paid on 28th! If private there might be a little more flexibility.

I presume it is a monthly payroll?

It is very unusual, IME, not to require someone to submit a claim, for audit purposes if nothing else.

[Smasher]

Re: My girlfriend's boss not paying her and avoiding contact

Ok, I'm not entirely sure on that point to be honest. I'll go thru all of this when I see her tonight.

Thanks

[teaboy2]

Re: My girlfriend's boss not paying her and avoiding contact

Hang on, you say she wasn't paid for july, but was paid in august - So do you mean June was the month she should have been paid for in July? Assuming she is paid month in arrears like most people that are paid monthly?

In any event is there was a cut of point the salary would still have been paid along with the next months salary. So if you missed the cut of point to be paid for june, then it would be paid along with the following months salary when following month salary was due to be paid!

[stevemLS]

Re: My girlfriend's boss not paying her and avoiding contact

[MENTION=19071]teaboy2[/MENTION] - OP says that it is the 95 hrs in July that is missing - so it seems there is a month adrift somewhere. I had already thought about the cut-off but OP needs to come back and clarify the systems questions I asked yesterday - his initial thought was that she didn't need to submit any sort of timesheets which I thought a bit surprising.

[teaboy2]

Re: My girlfriend's boss not paying her and avoiding contact

[MENTION=48758]stevemLS[/MENTION] - Yes i noticed [MENTION=1312]Smasher[/MENTION] had said 95hrs in July that weren't paid, but then was paid in August. That's why i was asking if it could be hours from June rather than from July as usually monthly paid workers would be paid for work done in july at the end of august. So yes we definitely need more clarification of the finer details. And yes it is strange that she doesn't need to submit a time sheet. My best friends wife is a carer, and she has too - I know that as her managers printer broke last week, so they couldn't print the time sheets off in order to submit them so she and other would get paid, so they emailed them to me to print off for them - Yes not exactly in line with data protection, but it was that or non of them got paid lol.

[Smasher]

Re: My girlfriend's boss not paying her and avoiding contact

Thanks guys. This woman actually came to find her yesterday and apologised for not returning calls & emails & said she was away and will pay her this Friday. So fingers crossed that'll be the end of that.. We'll see on Friday..

[stevemLS]

Re: My girlfriend's boss not paying her and avoiding contact

Excellent, let us know if it is finally sorted - is that tomorrow or next week?

[Smasher]

Re: My girlfriend's boss not paying her and avoiding contact

Thanks Steve, will do. It should be tomorrow..

[Smasher]

Re: My girlfriend's boss not paying her and avoiding contact

Sorry, she has been paid FOR August, she is still owed for July. She gets paid in the middle of the month, it will be middle of June to middle of July that she is owed for. They are a private company.

Still nothing. The lady from accouts assured her that the money had been transferred into her bank and should be there on Friday, but it wasn't and still isn't, so time to send this letter I guess..

[stevemLS]

Re: My girlfriend's boss not paying her and avoiding contact

If they only actually actioned it on Thursday there was little chance of it hitting her account on Friday, I think a standard BACS payment takes three days?

[Smasher]

Re: My girlfriend's boss not paying her and avoiding contact

Yes I thought that, but she said last Wednesday that it had been done, so that was 5 working days ago..

[Smasher]

Re: My girlfriend's boss not paying her and avoiding contact

She sent that letter by email and also tried calling. No answer & no reply.

She has cancelled her shifts now, so where do we go from here?