DR JANICE BRYDON v Cumbria, Northumberland, Tyne & Wear NHS Foundation Trust — 2021

Dr Janice Brydon brought complaints under section 13 of the Employment Rights Act 1996 about two matters: the Trust’s recovery from November 2019 of an alleged overpayment of £11,795.32, and the reduction of her monthly salary from October 2015 to the band 8(a) rate. The tribunal held that the employment contract was made before the later “Statement of Employment Particulars” was sent, and that document was only a written record of the contract rather than the instrument that created it.

On the facts found, Dr Brydon had applied for and accepted a band 8(a) Principal Clinical Psychologist role, and the contemporaneous offer letter of 20 January 2015 showed a starting salary of £40,558. The tribunal rejected her case that an April 2016 version of the offer letter was the operative document. It found that the later Statement of Employment Particulars, which stated a salary of £54,998, contained an obvious error and was not binding on the Trust. The tribunal concluded that Dr Brydon’s contractual salary was £40,558 per annum, so the higher payments made between February and September 2015 were overpayments.

Because the salary correctly payable was £40,558, the tribunal held that the Trust’s later deductions to recover the overpayment were excepted deductions under section 14(1) and were also authorised by the contractual repayment clause in the Statement of Employment Particulars. It further held that paying Dr Brydon at the ordinary band 8(a) rate from October 2015 was not an unlawful deduction, because that was the salary properly payable under the contract. Both complaints were therefore dismissed. The tribunal also went on to say that, if it had been wrong about the original contractual salary, Dr Brydon had in any event consented by conduct to a variation to the correct band 8(a) salary from October 2015.