Business lawyers!!!! Anybody help?

Mark twiglet

Mark twiglet

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Mark
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I'm self employed and was promised a scaled payment scheme as my wages but after working a year I've only seen straight forward wages! I could be owed thousands! I'm thinking of leaving the company.........

Is there a law to get me what I'm owed.
 
don't understand, if you are self employed have you not been invoicing your clients and being paid normally.

provide more information as to your circumstances.
 
I work and am paid on a flat day rate and my jobs are to survey for which I get a percentage of the net contract price ! When the amount surveyed per month exceeds my day rate amount I should be paid the excess periodically !
 
Mark twiglet said:
I'm self employed and was promised a scaled payment scheme as my wages but after working a year I've only seen straight forward wages! I could be owed thousands! I'm thinking of leaving the company.........

Is there a law to get me what I'm owed.
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Need way more info to offer anything to be honest.

My advice would be to speak to an "expert" rather than an internet forum.
 
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Presumably your contract of employment sets out the details of your pay structure. So the first thing to do, surely, is to compare notes with your employer. Do they agree with your assessment of what you should have been paid? If not, why not?
 
I have email proofs of the agreements first laid out when I joined! I approached blokey last week and challenged my predicament and he agreed to look into it but has since said nothing about it!
 
I go out and survey ........ They then price jobs up from my survey...... So I don't ever see the contract value so don't know what I'm going to get the set percentage of!
 
Try local solicitors with employment contract experience and initially see if they will provide a first 30 mins consultation foc

Yonks ago I got such a consultation.

On the face of it the contract is very one sided if you have no documented evidence of the sales above the threshold for your receiving the extra %.

Best of luck getting a resolution.

PS what you describe reminds of what I think was or is being a journeyman "employee". If so I surmise there are known contract forms for such work and hopefully easy to resolve with the right sort of proper legal advice.
 
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I'm no employment lawyer, but your language is all over the place here, and before you make enquiries you have to get your story straight.

If you're 'self employed' the person paying you isn't your employer, they're your primary contractor, and what they pay you isn't 'wages' it's your fee.

But from the sounds of this, you're not actually self employed at all, if everything to do with this 'job' is in the control of your 'employer' then you're employed, but they're trying to avoid being an employer for their own convenience. There's better guidance on HMRC's website, but basically if they're responsible for giving you work, training, they control your holidays, you don't have autonomy to hire staff to do the work for you or negotiate when and how it's done, then you're probably an employee.

Back to your question, as above, if you don't know what they should be paying you, how would you get to find out? All of that should have been stipulated in the contract. In fact, there should be a fresh contract for each 'job' they give you. It's time to sit down with them and ask how this is supposed to work.
 
Phil's response is excellent. Firstly you need to get straight whether you are an employee or a contractor. You haven't provided enough information for us to be able to work that out, but it does sound like you might well an employee.

And then, if your contract says your payment is based on the value of the job which you survey, then *surely* there must be a mechanism for communicating that value to you. What does your contract say?
 
Yes i agree with Phil it sounds like you're a employee not self employed.
 
I agree with you Phil and yes it needs sorting! I've been with them a year! They are my sole contractor and I work for them 40 hours a week plus and no other time for any other jobs! I don't have a formal contract with them at all! I'm paid a day rate with no sick or holiday pay but when I started they agreed to paying a day rate until I surveyed more than my day rates worth and then would adjust my wages accordingly! But I've done some huge jobs for them that must be worth more than my day rate ! They only calculate the cost of the contract after my survey it goes to be costed! So I never actually know what I've measured is actually worth and am never told what it actually is.......
 
Agree with Phil's comments. I suggest you call your local tax office and talk to someone there. I have always found HRMC very helpful. If you outline the circumstances of your work I'm sure they wil be able to advise. Only one thing though, if the company are trying to get out of their obligations as an employer (doing the tax and NI, for example, and potentially pension requirements) by treating you as self employed, they may simply cease giving you any jobs if HRMC tell them you have to be treated as employee.

Dave
 
do they run your payroll?

do you invoice them?

one or the other
 
Mark twiglet said:
I invoice them and they pay me every Friday!
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Therein lies the crux, on your invoice is there mention of further future payment? What does the contract say about the increased payment?
 
Mark twiglet said:
I agree with you Phil and yes it needs sorting! I've been with them a year! They are my sole contractor and I work for them 40 hours a week plus and no other time for any other jobs! I don't have a formal contract with them at all! I'm paid a day rate with no sick or holiday pay but when I started they agreed to paying a day rate until I surveyed more than my day rates worth and then would adjust my wages accordingly! But I've done some huge jobs for them that must be worth more than my day rate ! They only calculate the cost of the contract after my survey it goes to be costed! So I never actually know what I've measured is actually worth and am never told what it actually is.......
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A bit of fence sitting:
You can still be self employed even if you only ever work for the same contractor. There should though always be a contract when you do a job, in your case you agreeing to do the work they send is effectively the contract.

You just need to sit down and work out with them how the extra fee should be notified, it would be very little effort for them to copy you into the quote they send out, from that you can send a new invoice if they win the job.

Of course if they're happy with your work, but you're not earning enough, you're free to increase your day rate too. Or even negotiate a different method of calculating your rates.

There's not enough detail to say for sure, but IMHO they're sailing close to the wind not employing you, they're effectively saving a ton of money and hassle by sub contracting, and this should be reflected in your remuneration. The conversation could easily be opened with 'this isn't paying enough, if we can't get closer to my expected income when I joined I'll have to find a new job'.
 
Sounds like a plan mate!

Thank you!

I'm not even gonna say what industry I'm in (25 years now) but this is a trend I'm finding rather annoying! Rogue traders who try it on all the time!
 
Mark twiglet said:
Sounds like a plan mate!

Thank you!

I'm not even gonna say what industry I'm in (25 years now) but this is a trend I'm finding rather annoying! Rogue traders who try it on all the time!
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Good luck.
It's not important what business, but in the 90's the building industry went through this, to the point where the then Inland Revenue wrote whole new rules and guidance specific to them. And even now, the best definitions on 'sub contractor or employee' are to be found in the guidance for that industry.
 
And the Construction Industry Scheme has tightened up on the rampant cash-in-hand tax evasion that used to go on as well.

Blinking headache though, if you work for a property investment company that suddenly decides to do a major construction project without telling the tax department. Backfilling almost a year's worth of CIS forms and then having to go and see HMRC like a naughty schoolboy was not my finest hour!
 
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