please read im a bit stuck!

[steph89]

my ex employer has imformed me that he has accidently paid money in to my account which he shouldnt have and can i phone the bank to see if i can get it sent back to him. do I have to send it back? as i have not been working for them for a while now and i dont know why he still has my account details still so is it not his own mistake?

please help, steph.

[Allwood]

Did they give details of the overpayment ie a breakdown so you can check it. Also what does your contract say about overpayment's, I would check the wording of your contract of employment, as you still employed by them.

[Sidewinder]

Agree with Allwood that you really need to see a breakdown of the overpayment by your former employer. If the overpayment is genuine, then unfortunately you will have to give it back, but you are entitled to do so on your own terms. You would need to explain that to pay it all back at once would cause you hardship (of course this would depend on the amount of the overpayment and your financial circumstances) and that you propose to repay £x per week or per month accordingly.

 

Of course if the money has only just gone in and you hadn't yet noticed, or spent it in error then it would not be a huge problem to simply repay it in full, but if it was some time ago and the money is spent you would have a perfectly reasonable case to agree instalments.

 

Sadly you cannot keep the money, despite it being their mistake. You should though ask for your bank details to be deleted from their records to prevent it happening again. Hope this helps.

[paulgmb]

I would check to make sure that infact this money was not owed to you. Perhaps for holidays you had acrued but not taken for example?

 

They cannot demand the money back in one go. Are we talking about a large sum?

 

If it is a small amount it would cost them more to recover than the amount itself. You could make them an offer, say half?

 

If you left on bad terms you could just ignore them and see what happens but there are risks associated with this. They may try and take you to court which would cost them money, but would not cost you anything if you settled before you got there. If they sold the debt on, the debt agency could add there own costs, but I'm not sure if they could do this before going to court.

 

Remember this is your former employers mistake.

 

Regards,

 

Paul.

[Guest wino]

If the money isn't yours and an honest mistake has been made just give it back. I don't see why you would want to make a problem over this:confused:

[Weird Al Yankovic]

If the money isn't yours and an honest mistake has been made just give it back. I don't see why you would want to make a problem over this:confused:

 

I wouldn't say the OP is making a problem over this but, rather, her ex-employer has created a problem by paying this money and the OP wants advice. What is wrong with that?

 

I agree with Allwood's advice although the contract of employment, if you had a written one, needn't specify that wage's overpayment can be claimed back as it is a mistake of fact but it probably would state it.

 

Also, you can argue to pay the amount back at an agreed rate rather than one go.

 

Eg Somebody may have been sacked and the last salary included an overpayment of £500. However, the employer may have only noticed some time down the line but now the ex-worker is unemployed.

 

The employer couldn't claim all of the repayment in one go as the ex-employee would be unlikely to afford it and may have spent it all as it was declared wages owed at the time.

[patdavies]

Your ex-employer shouldn't still have your bank account details. DPA applies. Has this sum been NI/taxed?

 

Howevr, I think that we all need more detail before any definitive answers are provided.

[Allwood]

Firstly, you should write back to your former employer acknowledging their correspondence and say that you do not recall being overpaid and would they kindly let you know when this happened and also go give you a breakdown of the payment.:-|

[steph89]

I did not have any contract with the company nor sign anything similar. I did take 2 days holiday which I was not paid for at all though. the amount was £100.73 but considering i havnt worked there in about 5 months I can only assume that its not an overpayment but they have accidently paid some one elses wages into my account, which i state again they still shouldnt have otherwise none of this would have happened. and I am not kicking up a fuss about nothing I just want some friendly advice which on most part I seem to be getting so thanks guys!

[paulgmb]

Why did you not get paid for your holiday, (2 days) had you exhausted your holiday entitlement?

[steph89]

nope I only ever took those two days off.

[paulgmb]

Hi again Steph,

 

then depending how long you worked there they may owe you money.

 

Your annual holiday entitlement must have been at least 20 days per annum, and from 1-10-07 24 days although if you left 5 months ago probably the former.

 

How long were you there?

 

Regards,

 

Paul.