Mrs C King v City of York Council — 2023

Mrs C King was employed by City of York Council as a school business manager at Ralph Butterfield Primary School from 1 February 2006 until her retirement on 31 August 2022. A national pay settlement for local authority workers was reached on 1 November 2022 and backdated to 1 April 2022. Mrs King claimed arrears for the period from 1 April to 31 August 2022 after being told she would not receive the back pay.

The tribunal found that the claimant's contract provided for salaries to be reviewed annually in accordance with National Joint Council pay bargaining arrangements. It found that the 2022 pay agreement increased the applicable rate of pay from 1 April 2022, that the increase was referable to work done while the claimant was employed, and that the fact it became payable after her employment ended did not prevent it being wages.

The tribunal rejected the respondent's case that payment to leavers was simply discretionary. It found that arrears had historically been paid to leavers, and at Ralph Butterfield Primary School had been processed automatically. It also found there was no evidence of an earlier exercise of discretion by the Head of Paid Service and that the claimant did not know and had no reasonable way of knowing that the respondent had changed its policy in March 2022.

Applying sections 13, 27 and 230 of the Employment Rights Act 1996, and considering Hellewell, Park Cakes v Shumba, Leyland Vehicles v Reston and Robertson v Blackstone Franks, the tribunal held that £585.52 was properly payable to the claimant on 1 November 2022. The unauthorised deductions from wages claim succeeded and the respondent was ordered to pay the gross sum of £585.52. The tribunal said it was not necessary to determine breach of contract separately, but that in the alternative such a claim would succeed for the same reasons.