Mr J Moules v Churchill Knight Umbrella Ltd (First Respondent) Churchill Knight & Associates Ltd (Second Respondent) — 2023

The claimant, Mr J Moules, worked as a Senior Data Engineer through Churchill Knight Umbrella Ltd as an umbrella intermediary in a chain involving Concept Information Technology Ltd and an end user identified as Companies House. The tribunal found there was no contract between the claimant and Churchill Knight & Associates Ltd, so all complaints against the second respondent were dismissed. It also found that the claimant had read and understood the written employment contract, the assignment schedule, and the respondent's website material before signing on 19 November 2021.

On the merits, the tribunal found that the parties' actual agreement was not that the claimant would simply receive national minimum wage and a wholly discretionary bonus. Instead, it found that the respondent was to receive £510 per day from Concept, retain employer's national insurance, Apprenticeship Levy and £15 per week margin, and pay the balance to the claimant through the wage structure used on the payslips. On that basis, the complaints about employer's national insurance and the margin deduction failed. The tribunal also rejected the claim that PAYE deductions were an unlawful deduction from wages, holding that the dispute about the tax year allocation of the final payment fell within the statutory tax regime and HMRC mechanisms rather than tribunal jurisdiction, applying the reasoning in Patel v Marquette Partners.

The only successful complaint was the lateness issue. The tribunal found that £334.13 for the week ending 5 December 2021 was properly payable by 12 December 2021 but was paid on 13 December 2021, and that £334.13 for the week ending 26 December 2021 was properly payable by 2 January 2022 but was paid on 7 January 2022. Those were unauthorised deductions, but no further payment was ordered because the sums had already been paid in later larger payments before the claim was presented on 13 April 2022. All remaining wage complaints were dismissed, and the claimant was not awarded damages for breach of contract, interest, injury to feelings, pain and suffering, or distress and inconvenience.