December 07, 2015

In September 2015, the European Court of Justice gave the judgment that mobile workers, who have no fixed place of work and spend time travelling from home to their first and last customer should have this time considered as ‘working time’.  Therefore, if you are paying NMW for 40 hours working time but have not accounted the additional 10 hours per week of travelling to and from the first job, in the case of a mobile worker, then you will be paying below the NMW on the overall 50 hours per week worked.

November 07, 2015

Employers must take care when making deductions from wages, particularly if those deductions take the worker’s hourly rate below NMW.  For example, if you pay a worker, who is 27 years old, £6.80 per hour for a 40-hour week (£272 per week) and you deduct £15 a week for their uniform, this deduction will take their hourly rate to £6.43 per hour which is below the NMW rate.  Always check your position before you make deductions.  Some deductions will not reduce the hourly rate but you must always have a signed agreement in place, particularly if you intend to recover the whole amount should the worker leave your employment.

Failure to pay the NMW could result in you being ‘named and shamed’, having to pay all of the money you owe to the worker and a fine of up to £20,000 – don’t let this happen to you!