Thetownend.com

I need some (useful) advice.
I am a salaried employee with a small engineering company.
At present there is a shortage of work and I have been laid off for 3 weeks.
My boss only paid me for the one week I had worked.
Am I entitled to my full salary?

What does your contract say?

I haven't got a copy. Have worked as a salaried employee for 12 years and never had this situation before.

Ask hr for a copy of your contract.

Monthly salary?
Do you work on a casual basis?

No,  full time

If you are a full time member of staff without a contract specifying hourly rates for example (it might include minimum hours) then laying you off for 3 weeks sounds very odd indeed, not least because it is highly unlikely that is what can contractually happen.  12 years consecutive service would mean you are protected by Unfair Dismissal legislation and would be expecting redundancy should the firm actually be "laying you off".

Just because there is no work, does not mean they don't have to pay you - it is the company who has the responsibility to provide you with work reasonable to the role you are employed for.  They can make your role redundant with sufficient notice (and depending on size of business they might need to consult first).

This sounds like a temporary arrangement though, and the only way they can adjust earnings is if you have some sort of contractual term providing for that, which means you wouldn't really be salaried but paid by the hour, just always having the same every pay period until now.  Even in that circumstance they'd be on very dodgy grounds with the pre-existing hours creating an implied term - essentially if you don't change the persons hours for long enough a period of time and employment tribunal would more than likely find the new hours had become a term in your contract.

Sounds like either more information is needed here.  Businesses have many ways of avoiding costs, but this would be very rare in my opinion due to the various protections in place and the risk of a tribunal.

Thanks RobertT
From that it seems like I have some cause for hope in that I may have the upper hand if the situation continues or escalates.
A bit wary of chopping off my nose to spite my face though as getting a similar job locally is very remote.

The boss is HR   :(

BTW. not a lawyer or in HR (although work closely with them), but my purpose in life is to tell companies how to employ less people - and this is not a method I have stumbled across until now, good luck.

They must have a copy of your contract....I believe they are legally obliged to do so...

Have you been laid off or are you just not being asked to work in the slow period?

If you aren't working in a slow period and you don't have contracted hours you might be stuffed e.g. zero hours contract.

If you've been laid off:

Look at https://www.gov.uk/redundant-your-rights/redundancy-pay
and https://www.gov.uk/calculate-your-redundancy-pay
for calculating what you should have been paid. It's definitely more than a week.

Likewise, you should have had a consultation before you were laid off. If you didn't that could suggest you were unfairly dismissed: https://www.gov.uk/staff-redundant/redundancy-consultations

Oh and you're supposed to have had adequate notice so you can find a new job etc. - in your case that would be 12 weeks https://www.gov.uk/staff-redundant/giving-staff-notice

Get in touch with acas for advice http://www.acas.org.uk/
I'm sure they will be telling you that you have a very strong case for unfair dismissal

Thanks Simon
Very slow period but 4 others at the company are still working full time.
I have been paid monthly by salary for approx 12 years.
My employer told me the other day that he is within the law by laying both of us off without pay for a period of time which he did not specify.
I will ask him for a copy of my employment contract on Monday and get my ducks in a row before I take things further.
It seems to both of us that we are being headed to the exit door in the least expensive manner for him.

Just read the 13 weeks info regarding redundancy payments.
He is definitely playing that one as he is giving us a few days work every couple of weeks and only paying for the hours worked instead of the normal monthly salary.

I'd get in touch with acas for advice for definite

This!

Once an employer knows you have taken advice the attitude can often change!

Or Citizens Advice Bureau, found them to be quicker than ACAS and they need the money (by this I mean that most of their funding is dependent upon how many people they help and thus if they help you they will get more cash to help other people).

Whatever you do make sure you get all the advice you can, my missus was made redundant in very dubious circumstances years back and basically took a couple of hundred on top of basic salary requirement to go quietly (she was looking to leave anyway so it wasn't a great hardship). She coincidentally went to work at the local CAB a few years later and discovered (chatting over a brew with their employment expert) that she had been royally screwed over and could have absolutely battered them for unfair dismissal for the way they did it.  

Most employers know fuck all about employment law!