Mrs I Turina v Penny Davis T/A DPC Clinic — 2024

Mrs Turina resigned with immediate effect on 20 July 2023. When her final salary and accrued holiday pay came to be paid, the respondent withheld the net sum of £1,288 and applied it against what it said were recoverable training costs for a CIBTAC Level 4 course. The tribunal recorded that the original employment contract contained a deductions clause and a training clause, and that the claimant had also signed a separate training agreement on 14 January 2021 under which the employer agreed to pay course fees of £5,940 and examination fees of £350.

The tribunal found that the training agreement had been incorporated into the claimant’s contract of employment and that, when the employment transferred to the respondent on 22 December 2022 under TUPE, the relevant contractual rights and liabilities transferred as well. It accepted that the claimant completed the course on 8 June 2023 and resigned within six months of completion, which on the wording of the training agreement triggered 100% repayment of the course and exam fees. The tribunal also found that the respondent remained liable for those fees after the transfer, notwithstanding the absence of all invoices in the bundle and the claimant’s argument about the transferor’s financial position.

The claimant argued that the deductions clause did not cover a resignation after completion, that the training agreement was not incorporated or novated, that Penny Dee Limited was insolvent, that the respondent had not actually paid the fees, and that the deduction pushed pay below the National Minimum Wage. The tribunal rejected each point. It held that the contract’s reference to “individual training agreements” and the variation clause supported incorporation, that TUPE transferred the relevant rights and liabilities without any separate novation, that there was no evidence of formal insolvency proceedings at the time of transfer, and that the claimant’s resignation was an “any other event” for the purposes of regulation 12(2)(a) of the National Minimum Wage Regulations 2015, relying on Lorne Stewart.

The tribunal concluded that the deduction from final pay was authorised by written contractual terms, that the claimant had a copy of those terms before the deduction was made, and that the respondent was therefore entitled to withhold the £1,288. The claim for unlawful deductions from wages was dismissed.