Miss T Cummins v Able UK Limited — 2020

Miss Cummins was employed by Able UK Limited from 11 November 2019 until 18 June 2020, when her resignation took effect. The claim before the tribunal was that the respondent had failed to pay part of holiday pay due on termination under regulation 14(2) of the Working Time Regulations 1998. The tribunal identified the issues as the leave year, the amount accrued, the amount taken, whether any days had been carried over or taken in excess from earlier years, and the relevant daily rate.

The tribunal found that the claimant's contract required employees to take at least three days of holiday over the Christmas shutdown, and that by Christmas 2019 her pro rata entitlement was three days. She had actually taken and been paid for seven days, so she had been overpaid by four days. The respondent did not realise this at the time, but when it later processed her leaving payroll it deducted four days' pay from her final salary under a contractual deduction clause that authorised deductions for overpayment or overtaken holiday entitlement.

The tribunal rejected the claimant's case that the four days had been a discretionary payment or that she had any entitlement to keep them. It accepted the respondent's evidence that the deduction was made because of the overpayment, and it found the claimant had no reasonable expectation that the days would be gifted to her. Although the tribunal criticised the respondent for not advising her in writing before making the deduction, it held that this did not alter the legal position.

On the termination calculations, the tribunal found that the claimant's leave year began at the end of the Christmas shutdown, that 24 weeks of the leave year had passed by the termination date, that 10.5 days had accrued, and that she had taken 0.5 days in 2020. It concluded that she had been paid the total due for the 2020 leave year after the deduction, so no days remained unpaid or owing and the regulation 14 claim was not well-founded.