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Husband losing £6000 per annum as company stopping on call

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Need some advice please.

 

My husband has worked for the same company for 18 years, he currently holds an IT role. 3 years ago both him and a colleague went for the same job, both did well enough in the interview to get the job but there was only one position. There gave the other candidate first refusal on whether they wanted that job or they could keep their current job but be put on call. They gave the other candidate first choice as they did slightly better in the interview. They choose to take the new position, my husband was then given the on call job.

 

He gets a basic salary of around £21,000 plus an extra £6000 for being on call. His normal day to day role is the same, he gets the extra for being on call - so not a pay rise or promotion. At the time he was told that the company would always need someone to do on call so it was as good as a pay rise. I'm sure at this point you can see where this is going.

 

The company has merged with another company and they use a contractor to come out during out of office hours. This means as from June my husband will stop doing on call and will lose £6000 a year.

 

Now as far as my knowledge goes it's a case of tough, however my husband thinks that as they have been paying it for so long then maybe it is deemed contractual so they cannot take the £6000 off him. Does anyone have any insight to who is correct?

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Doesn't fully answer your question, but here is an article explaining how some payments and terms of employment can become contractual after some time. This focusses more on things like bonus payments though:

 

http://www.shoosmiths.co.uk/client-resources/legal-updates/when-does-custom-practice-create-legal-entitlement-employment-benefits-5896.aspx

 

You might need to speak to an employment lawyer about this particular case.

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Hi thanks. I had already read that but I didn't think it applied.

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He gets money to provide service, he will not get that money if they don't need that service any more.

I don't think that on-call bonus or any other bonus can become permanent.

Claiming that he is somehow entitled to this money is plain wrong.

But it is a huge change in circumstances.

See what his contract says about that.

Best for your husband to discuss this with new management.

There is a chance that he will get something out of it.

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He has and will be discussing it further but his direct manager is only in two days a week, so of course things take a little longer.

 

I too hope that he can sort something out but I wanted to confirm if he had any rights. Of course if he did have any and his employer couldn't offer something then of course he could remind them of his rights. Of course if he doesn't have any then that avenue is closed.

 

He has asked if another position could be found, they have another site outside of Sheffield which he could commute to. He has asked if there are any positions available there.

 

It is a huge change in circumstances for us especially as I don't work at the moment because we have two young children.

 

No long ago he bought a new car (well second hand but new to us) and took a loan out to pay for it. We just moved from Virgin Media to Sky so are tied into a 12 month contract, same with mobile phone. Plus the holiday we just booked in Jan. I'm learning to drive and have just booked my test for May. Its just all come at once!

 

On the plus side he has at least been given notice of the change so he might be able to find a new job before then.

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What does his contract actual say about the matter?

When he took the new job a year ago, did he get a letter explaining the salary and the on call charge?

When the company merged was this a take over of your husbands company or the other way round (there are potential for TUPE issues).

 

I think given the amount involved and the time involved there could be a case for custom and practise (as per that article) but if he had a letter stating it then the case will be solid.

 

It is quite complex as you could argue that the reduction in wage is substantial and that is covered by all sorts of law and case law.

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As he was worked for them for 18 years so its hard to remember exact dates.

 

He worked for Company X on the phones, Company Z took over the call centre, later Company X retook over the call centre. So he had a Company X contract tuped over to Company Z tuped back over to Company X. The last time it was tuped over was around 8 years ago and this was at the time that he was sent on a secondment to the IT department. According to company policy after 6 months of a secondment you are either meant to be offered the job permanently or be put back onto your old department. Neither happened and it wasn't until around 2 years later that he was given the job permanently and received a pay increase.

 

So he was doing his IT job officially for around 1 year before being offered the on call. During this time his contract has not changed, it makes no mention of the on call or of his IT position. It is a standard contact used by the company.

 

His job role is still the same as it was during normal hours before the on call. His job title has not changed, which is Systems Analyst, however he is expected to be available to fix IT problems out of office hours. He gets the extra £6000 for this duty. The only acknowledgement the company make of this extra £6000 is on his wage slips which say something like "extra duties" as a description.

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Surely he will still have his pay slips to show you the dates? I still have mine going right back to 1983.

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No he does not keep his wage slips. He can go back as far as two years ish ago as they have an online system now. I can get him to log in an double check how far back he can go.

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Even with on line stuff I either copy and save to hard drive or other device or print off. Otherwise things can conveniently disappear.

 

I really feel for you, it's a lot of money and so unjust. I know you can't be sentimental in business but it's not ethical, not something that would sit well with me.

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How is it unethical to move the on-call service to an outside company which will only charge £3000 a year instead of keeping it in house at a cost of £6000+?

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Do you know something we don't know Cyclone?

 

It would not surprise me if it cost less in house. Outsourcing costs a fortune which is why they retook over the call centre. The company who they merged with was already using a 3rd party and want to carry on using them for whatever reason and this may have nothing to do with a £3000 saving a year or any saving at all.

 

The merger occurred about 18 months ago it has taken all this time to sort out all the support network, and they have only after all this time agreed what to do with the on call. It takes a lot of red tape with big corporations. It is often hard for people to understand when they have never worked for a multi-national. Because they are so large the slightest change takes huge amounts of time and in the end it might cost more money because someone didn't take X, Y, or Z into calculation (this often happens as the people making the decision are not even based in the same city never-mind same building so have no idea how the day to day running of things works).

 

£6000 a year is peanuts to a company which turned over 10 billion last year. His direct manager didn't even know how much he would lose when he told him he was losing on call, according to my husband he was quite shocked.

 

Anyway non of that changes his rights or lack of rights as far as I am aware. I was hoping that someone might be able to clarify if he does have a leg to stand on? If not then I think he will need to see an employment solicitor.

 

---------- Post added 05-03-2016 at 08:30 ----------

 

Just want to correct something, not sure if it makes any difference.

 

In regards to the promotion he originally missed out on. At the time the team he was on consisted of two people. Both people went for the same promotion and both did well enough to get the job. There was actually 3 positions available so they could have both taken up the offer of the new job, on more money.

 

However, the department couldn't lose both people. So at this point they decide to offer one of the applicants on call instead, this was in order to keep one of them still on the team. His colleague got first dibs as to whether he wanted the new position or to keep his old position but do on call. He chose the new job, this meant my husband kept his old job but got on call. BTW they needed someone to do on call anyway, it wasn't just created for him. And he could have taken the new position if he wanted and left the team with no one but he did not want to upset his managers.

Edited by Love2print

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