Miss S Adams v Chartwells Compass Group — 2019

Miss S Adams brought a claim of unlawful deduction from wages against Chartwells Compass Group. Employment Judge Corrigan, sitting alone at Ashford on 24 July 2019, dismissed the claim as not well-founded.

The tribunal found that the claimant had been paid the correct gross amounts during her employment. The claimant believed too much tax had been deducted because she had started on the wrong tax code, but the judge said that, if correct, that was a matter for her employer and HMRC and could not be checked on the limited documents available, which were only the claimant's March 2018 payslips.

The main factual issue concerned an incorrect first payslip showing gross pay of £929.37 and net pay of £743.57. The tribunal accepted that this payslip was wrong and that it was corrected the same month by a further payslip dated 29 March 2018 showing the net pay reversal. The judge also accepted from the claimant's bank statement and the respondent's letter that the sum shown on the first payslip was never actually paid, despite the letter inaccurately suggesting it had been paid and then recovered.

The claimant argued that the respondent should have helped further by providing an EYU promptly so that her housing benefit position could be corrected. The tribunal held that disputes about the EYU, and whether housing benefit was incorrectly stopped, did not fall within the tribunal's jurisdiction.