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Thread: 0 hours workers Paid below National Minum Wage Travel Lodge

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    Senior Member j1979's Avatar
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    0 hours workers Paid below National Minum Wage Travel Lodge

    Travel Lodge have been paying indirectly their workers well below the national minimum wage. This is something that really angers me and make me very embarrassed of this country. Hotel room housekeepers are expected to clean each room in 15 mins or they miss out on getting the the £6.31 per hour they legally are entitled to. 15 mins per room is to say the least impossible. 30 mins is difficult.

    My wife also works for the Company "travel lodge" through the agency ISS.

    And yes they pay below national minimum wage. the minimum wage is now being £6.31 as of October this year. According to http://acas.org.uk cleaners are not exempt from the National Minimum Wage.

    The way travel lodge get around the law is by out sourcing to ISS. The way ISS get around the law is to, write a "contract" stating the worker is paid national minimum wage but on 0 hours contract.

    Now when a worker does their shift, they will get paid per room at a very low rate with the target of 15 mins per room. So if you worked for 4 hours but only cleaned 8 rooms (which is a realistic target) you will only get paid for he target time 8 rooms x 15 mins = 2 hours. You can even have a situation where you need to wait around for late checkouts to leave to clean the last room /few rooms.

    Of cause it's illegal, but who will hold them to account? They can't go to a tribunal or do an ET1 form as they would not fit the criteria, citizens advice are powerless, and although technically a criminal offense the police would not take any action.

    It leaves the 0 hours worker pretty stuffed. They can complain (likely fruitless) or go to a solicitor and pay him for 1 hours work at £60 (30 travel lodge / ISS hours) and try to get what is owed . But they are do not have contracted hours. A worker who complains will likely have the 0 hour contract fulfilled and not work in the future.

    I have currently started self employment and asked my wife to work extra to bridge the gap until my business is holding it's own. But after 4 weeks of employment at approx 20 hours a week. My wife has earned under £200 before deductions. Job-seekers allowance is £71 afaik. ( the minimum the government considers you can survive on).

    Anyway I am currently looking at the payslip vs the hours worked and we will be taking some kind of action.

    I wrote this post to give some information to the poor people that find themselves also exploited by this system. I for one will NEVER EVER use Travel Lodge again and neither will any of my family.

    If you find yourself in this situation I suggest contacting you local MP. You can find there details and email address here. http://findyourmp.parliament.uk/
    Enter your post code of your home address.

    CONTACT THEM! And tell them the situation.


    Also use the http://acas.org.uk website for free and correct advice.
    Or call the number below.
    Helpline number: 08457 47 47 47
    Monday-Friday: 8am-8pm and Saturday 9am-1pm

    Interesting link below.
    http://www.acas.org.uk/index.aspx?articleid=1873

    ---------------------------


    If any hexus members know of any genuine work from home jobs, I would love to hear from you guys.

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  3. #2
    OilSheikh
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    Re: 0 hours workers Paid below National Minum Wage Travel Lodge

    If no one signs the contract, ISS will surely be forced to pay the rightful rates ?

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    Re: 0 hours workers Paid below National Minum Wage Travel Lodge

    I would not seek to justify what appears, from that account, to be a disgraceful state of affairs, and a way to bypass national min wage. Not in any way justified.


    BUT .... I would just caution not to do what I've seen several TV interviewees, usually union reps, do, which is to lump ALL zero hour contracts into one group, and condemn them en-masse.

    I spent years doing sub-contract work on a zero hours basis, and generally, I'd find what, if any, hours were required late in the week (Thurs normally) for work needed the week after next. I wasn't EVER guaranteed any work at all beyond that agreed on the Thursday, but nor was I required to accept any.

    And it's that latter bit that suited me, and several dozen others working for the same company, just perfectly. I was doing other things, and accepted each job on a case by case basis, if it suited me, depending on what day it was on, and where it was (pretty much anywhere in the country), and how many hours it was for. So, if I was free, I took it, but if I had something else that day, or just didn't fancy a 400 mile each way drive, I didn't.

    It was not, I accept, a minimum wage job (not by one heck of a margin), and NOT the kind of situation j1979 is talking about.

    As I said, what's going on there looks disgraceful, but not all zero hour contracts are either badly paid, or against the wishes of the contractee. In my case, the company could not have taken the contract with their employer without staff on zero hour contracts, and I would not have taken the sub-contract job had it not been zero hour, with the flexibity that entails. And that, I guess, is my point. Zero hour contracts suit those that want flexibility and will sacrifice predictability and security of hours/income to get it. They are not always, as those union reps suggested, always either bad, or exploitative. THAT is down to the actions of the employer using them.

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    Re: 0 hours workers Paid below National Minum Wage Travel Lodge

    Quote Originally Posted by OilSheikh View Post
    If no one signs the contract, ISS will surely be forced to pay the rightful rates ?
    Perhaps, but that is effectively a "race to the bottom". Or to put that another way, market forces at operation.

    Your logic only works if nobody else comes along that will sign. But isn't that the way of things these days?

    That's why zero-hour can be exploitative in low-skills jobs, but not in the situation I was referring to above, where finding skilled people isn't that easy.

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    Senior Member j1979's Avatar
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    Re: 0 hours workers Paid below National Minum Wage Travel Lodge

    Quote Originally Posted by OilSheikh View Post
    If no one signs the contract, ISS will surely be forced to pay the rightful rates ?

    I wish it were that straight forward. If they don't sign they don't get a job sadly. For employees to take a stand after they have signed the contract are effectively resigning at the same time. The contact says £6.19 per hour, but 0 hours.

    My wife is from Ukraine, and although she has worked in relatively good jobs in Ukraine, ( office work ), she is unable to get any employment here apart from cleaning, based on what I can only describe as (unprovable) discrimination.

    I feel so bad, because this is her first real job after a long time trying. and after me promising a minimum of £6.19 / £6.31 for this to happen I fell so ashamed of the UK.

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    Senior Member j1979's Avatar
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    Re: 0 hours workers Paid below National Minum Wage Travel Lodge

    Quote Originally Posted by Saracen View Post
    They are not always, as those union reps suggested, always either bad, or exploitative. THAT is down to the actions of the employer using them.
    I understand and agree with you that not all 0 hours contracts are bad.

    But this particular case is a blatant exploitation of some of the most vulnerable workers in the UK.

    Anyway I am sure we will in the end get her correct wages, and she will be leaving this job because after bus fare and other deductions, she is making about £7 a day for 4 hours work.

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    Re: 0 hours workers Paid below National Minum Wage Travel Lodge

    Quote Originally Posted by j1979 View Post
    The contact says £6.19 per hour, but 0 hours.
    I'm no expert, but to me that says that although she is not guaranteed any hours, the hours that she does work SHOULD be paid at the CONTRACTED rated of £6.19, and nothing less.

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    Re: 0 hours workers Paid below National Minum Wage Travel Lodge

    Again, I don't want to defend this in anyway, but I suspect wat ISS are actually doing is employing your wife as a subcontractor at a pre agreed rate of X per room and I suspect its actually ISS rather than travellodge that are engaging in the questionable practices here (although I imagine they're complicit due to the fact that they'll be continually pressuring the contract price).

    Whilst it might not make up the difference, you should take a look at the contract, if she is indeed self employed you may be able to claim some additional tax allowances. You also want to make sure you're taking full advantage of the rest of the tax system. (Note - I'm not condoning it, just suggesting you might be able to get something out of a bad situation)

    As far as jobs go, I can only sympathise, My next door neighbours are polish and suffered some similar issues when they moved here (he was fine since he's a mechanic, but she struggled to find unskilled jobs).

    Have you tried the local supermarkets etc? They're likely to be taking on additional staff at the moment, and I know a couple of people who have impressed then turned that into a full time position.

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    Re: 0 hours workers Paid below National Minum Wage Travel Lodge

    What Flash said, does your wife hand in time sheets? Or just something to say how many rooms were done?

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    Re: 0 hours workers Paid below National Minum Wage Travel Lodge

    also - agency work to bump the wages up include holiday pay in the headline pay figure , as by law you have holiday - so the real wage in far less anyway

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    Re: 0 hours workers Paid below National Minum Wage Travel Lodge

    Contact someone like the Guardian or Daily Mail? They would like a story like this IMO...

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    Re: 0 hours workers Paid below National Minum Wage Travel Lodge

    i suggest the employee discusses this with ACAS who can give advice on how to proceed. the law may or may not be broken. if it is then ACAS should be able to advise a course of action

    just a couple of things to point out, based on what is said, ISS is the employer, not travel lodge, so travel lodge aren't doing anything wrong at all. they will be invoiced by the agency and pay them. it's the agencies responsibility to pay it's employees the appropriate wage, deduct PAYE, auto pension enroll, SSP, SMP, and ensure all employment laws are followed. TL will be paying ISS well over the NMW to account for the employers NI, holiday and sick entitlement, other costs such as admin, and a profit margin for the agency who is responsible for recruiting and providing staff so TL have adequate cleaning cover at all times and won't get caught out due to holidays and sickness

    regarding the contract of employment, this is legally binding regardless of if it's signed by the employee or not. similar to a contract of sale when you buy something in a store, you accept the terms and conditions of employment by commencing work in the first instance (ie. on day one). it's up to the employee to obtain a copy of T&C's (aka contract) prior to commencing work if they want to check what they are entering into, but similar to a contract of sale, most people don't bother and only find out the detail at a later date such as when there may be an issue

    so TL may or may not be aware of this practice, and even if they did, it's up to ISS to resolve it, not TL. but with many people happy to take any job they can, and a large number of people looking for work, ISS should have no problem picking and choosing staff if someone leaves because they aren't happy with the terms, so complain at your own risk as they may simply get someone else to do the work instead

    btw rolled up holiday pay is illegal, you can't include holiday pay in the hourly rate

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    Re: 0 hours workers Paid below National Minum Wage Travel Lodge

    The zero hours part isn't directly relevant to the complaint here, yes it means that your hours are variable and not guarenteed, but that is not the issue in the question. I would advise dropping mentioning that from your arguement, to keep things focused.

    The key complaint is that your wife has a contracted hourly rate, but by tying in the KPI of "rooms cleaned", your wife is being denied being paid her contracted rate.

    I would suggest seeking out legal advice before trying to proceed with a complaint - start with the Pay and Work Rights helpline on 0800 917 2368.

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    Re: 0 hours workers Paid below National Minum Wage Travel Lodge

    Quote Originally Posted by Lucio View Post
    The zero hours part isn't directly relevant to the complaint here, yes it means that your hours are variable and not guarenteed, but that is not the issue in the question. I would advise dropping mentioning that from your arguement, to keep things focused.

    The key complaint is that your wife has a contracted hourly rate, but by tying in the KPI of "rooms cleaned", your wife is being denied being paid her contracted rate.

    I would suggest seeking out legal advice before trying to proceed with a complaint - start with the Pay and Work Rights helpline on 0800 917 2368.
    I disagree. If she were contracted for 20 hours a week she would be paid for 20 hours a week. But she is contracted for 0 hours, and works for approximately 20 but paid for approximately 10. If she were not on a 0 hours contract this abuse of the law could not happen as easily.

    They pay her per room, even if she has to wait 2 hours at the end of her shift to do the final room due to a late checkout she will still only get paid £1.48 for that room. It's a direct abuse of the 0 Hours contract.

    PS thanks for the number

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    Seething Cauldron of Hatred TheAnimus's Avatar
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    Re: 0 hours workers Paid below National Minum Wage Travel Lodge

    Do you have legal insurance with your home insurance? My premium is about £6 per year for it.

    It would be a good port of call.

    If however she is working as a Sole Trader or something similar, you will find you are SOL.
    throw new ArgumentException (String, String, Exception)

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    Re: 0 hours workers Paid below National Minum Wage Travel Lodge

    Quote Originally Posted by j1979 View Post
    I disagree. If she were contracted for 20 hours a week she would be paid for 20 hours a week. But she is contracted for 0 hours, and works for approximately 20 but paid for approximately 10. If she were not on a 0 hours contract this abuse of the law could not happen as easily.

    They pay her per room, even if she has to wait 2 hours at the end of her shift to do the final room due to a late checkout she will still only get paid £1.48 for that room. It's a direct abuse of the 0 Hours contract.

    PS thanks for the number
    Yes, it is true if she were on a 20hr contract that she would be paid that, but you would still have the same issue of extra hours worked waiting around for rooms to empty.

    However the real issue is not the fact that she doesn't have any guaranteed hours, but the fact that she is not being paid for the hours that she does work. This is true if she had contracted hours or not, as they could have her on a 10hr contract, have her work 20 and still only pay her for 10 - THAT is this the issue.

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