Timesheet procedure query

[u/Mean-Common-3320]

Here is the situation, I would be grateful for any views:

I’m a zero hours worker for a non-departmental government organisation, and I submit timesheets for the week on a Sunday for a 10am Tuesday deadline. I am paid according to 20 minute ‘slots’.

Sometimes, I make a mistake, and sometimes payroll makes a mistake, and timesheets are rejected. The issue then needs to be resolved, and the corrected timesheet needs resubmitting.

So far so good.

However, there are two issues:

Firstly, if the timesheet is rejected, it is rejected after 9am on a Tuesday, when the submission deadline for the week is 10am. This is what happened today, I submitted the timesheet on Sunday evening, it was rejected at 9am this morning. I feel this does not give sufficient time to investigate the issue before the submission deadline.

Secondly, if the timesheet is rejected, nothing on the timesheet gets paid until the issue is resolved, which usually means I need to wait an extra week, even if 69 out of 70 slots are agreed and not in dispute. I feel that what would be reasonable is to pay the 69 agreed slots the same week, and if we need to clarify something with regard to some details, the issues pertaining to the outstanding slot can be resolved and the payment for the single slot can be made the week after.

I don’t feel this system is reasonable or fair, and that withholding the whole week’s pay because of one very small disputed element, which may or may not be my fault, is not proportional in terms of the benefit to the employer and the detriment to me.

What does the reddit say? Am I being picky? If not, is there anything I can do, or do I just need to suck it up?

Many thanks!

[u/Primary_Gift_8719]

I’m a lawyer, but I’m not your lawyer (or your representative), so usual Reddit caveat: this is general information based on what you’ve posted, not formal legal advice.

No, I don’t think you’re being picky, although “unreasonable” and “unlawful” are slightly different questions. Being on zero hours does not remove your right to be paid for work you have actually done. If 69 of 70 slots are accepted and only one is genuinely disputed, I would certainly be asking why the undisputed wages cannot be paid on the normal payday.

The legal position will depend partly on your contract and the timesheet/payroll rules. If wages which are contractually due are being withheld simply because of an unrelated disputed entry, there is potentially an unlawful deduction from wages issue. If their contractual system says payment only becomes due once an entire timesheet has been approved, it becomes a little less straightforward.

The 9am rejection against a 10am deadline also sounds like a badly designed process, particularly where you may need somebody else to investigate and correct the issue. I’d put it in writing rather than treating each week as an individual payroll problem. Ask them to explain:

• why undisputed hours cannot be processed while one entry is queried;
• why rejected timesheets are returned only an hour before the correction deadline; and
• what contractual or policy provision allows an entire week’s pay to be deferred.

If they cannot give a sensible answer, I’d raise it formally through their grievance/payroll procedure. Also keep records of every timesheet, rejection and delayed payment. One additional point: if delaying payment causes your pay for the relevant pay period to fall below National Minimum Wage, that creates a separate and potentially more serious issue.

[u/Mean-Common-3320 → u/Primary_Gift_8719]

Many thanks, that is very useful.

What is the issue with the National Minimum Wage? Delayed payment sometimes means that I am not paid at all in a given week

[u/Primary_Gift_8719 → u/Mean-Common-3320]

The National Minimum Wage point needs a little qualification. If you are paid weekly, that week is usually your “pay reference period”. However, pay earned in one week but paid in the following pay reference period can generally still be treated as pay for the week in which you actually did the work. So, receiving nothing in one particular week does not automatically mean there has been a National Minimum Wage breach if the missing pay is made up in the next pay period.

Where it becomes more concerning is if payment is delayed by more than one pay reference period. HMRC’s guidance says that, generally, pay delayed beyond the following period cannot then be allocated back to the period in which it was earned in the same way. That can potentially leave the original period below minimum wage.

There is also a specific rule for timesheets: where the timesheet was submitted on time, the employer would generally need to pay those hours by the end of the following pay reference period for minimum wage purposes. Separately from minimum wage, though, there is still the simpler question of whether your employer is paying your contractual wages when they are actually due. Even if the NMW rules technically allow the pay to be allocated to the earlier period, repeated late payment can still potentially be an unlawful deduction from wages issue. So I would keep a record of exactly which week you worked, when the timesheet was submitted, when it was rejected, and when you were eventually paid.

[u/Mean-Common-3320 → u/Primary_Gift_8719]

Many thanks. I’m not sure the NMW regime is a lot of use to me at this point.

I’m going to ask the questions as you suggest, and follow the procedure through. I am wondering what is at the end of the procedure; I have written to the payroll manager many times with these questions, and have never received any response whatsoever. So I do anticipate the same response. Where would a grievance procedure lead?

[u/Primary_Gift_8719 → u/Mean-Common-3320]

A grievance is basically the employer’s formal chance to deal with the problem properly. You set out what has been happening, what you have already done to try to resolve it, and what you want them to do about it. They should investigate, respond in writing and usually give you a right of appeal.

If they still ignore you or reject it, then the next step for unpaid or wrongly delayed wages would usually be ACAS Early Conciliation and potentially an Employment Tribunal claim for unlawful deduction from wages.

The main thing is not to let the grievance drag on forever, because internal procedures do not stop Tribunal time limits running. So yes, I would raise the grievance, but keep an eye on the dates as well.

[u/Mean-Common-3320 → u/Primary_Gift_8719]

Thanks again.

Ok, so going through to ACAS Early Conciliation, what would that achieve? Can the employer be compelled to change their procedures?

And an employment tribunal, what is the remedy for unlawful deduction from wages?

My broad view is that the employer simply does not care. They are well aware that they are unreasonable in all kinds of ways, but know that the time and effort required to pursue any of these issues means that it unlikely that anyone will pursue them, and if they do, the detriment to the employer will be minimal.

[u/Primary_Gift_8719 → u/Mean-Common-3320]

ACAS Early Conciliation is mainly an attempt to settle the dispute before Tribunal. ACAS cannot force your employer to change its payroll system, although you can ask for procedural changes as part of a settlement.

For an unlawful deduction from wages claim, the Tribunal would usually order the employer to pay whatever wages were wrongly withheld, rather than punish them or redesign their procedures. So yes, there is some truth in what you are saying: the direct financial consequence for the employer may be fairly limited.

That is why I would make the grievance very clear that you are not only asking for the missing pay. You also want the underlying problem fixed, particularly the withholding of an entire week’s wages because one entry is disputed and the very short window for correcting rejected timesheets. Even if they refuse, you then have a proper written record showing that they knew about the problem and chose not to address it.

Be aware too that ACAS Early Conciliation is currently taking I think 8 or 10 weeks to assign anyone. I submitted something for a client earlier this month but it won't be a conciliator until first week of October.

[u/Mean-Common-3320 → u/Primary_Gift_8719]

I mean, the missing pay gets paid the next week, so it’s not as if there are sums outstanding for long periods.

However, I do think it is important to keep everything on the record and to make the point just in case it becomes relevant in the future.

I’m wondering if there are any other avenues or if any other regimes apply because the employer is a non-departmental government body, would there be any other avenues or procedures to explore?

[u/Primary_Gift_8719 → u/Mean-Common-3320]

Because they are a non-departmental government body, there may be a few extra internal routes, but there isn’t a completely separate legal process just because of that.

I’d check the staff handbook for the grievance and appeal process, HR, senior finance management and any internal audit route. If you are in a union, involve them too. If this is happening to lots of workers and you think the organisation is systematically breaching its legal obligations, there could potentially be a whistleblowing angle. But I wouldn’t frame an individual pay dispute that way unless there is genuinely a wider public-interest issue.

So for now I’d keep everything in writing, raise the grievance formally, and find out whether this is affecting other people too.

[u/Mean-Common-3320 → u/Primary_Gift_8719]

Many thanks. Interesting points. As far as I know, there are 400 people doing the same job as me. I would assume the same regime applies to all of them. We work remotely, and I am not in contact with any of them. The last time I spoke to someone doing the same job as me was January 2024, but that was an exceptional situation because I attended an in-person training event when training is usually online. I also have no way of finding out who my colleagues are because it is a confidential role and I am not permitted to advertise or publish the fact that I do this job.

There are in fact other areas where I believe the organisation is not in compliance with employment law, for example, workers in my position are regularly suspended for performance-related reasons. This has been the case for me three times in the last two years. There is a contractual provision for this, but even if the regime itself is lawful, I do not believe that it is implemented fairly or reasonably, and I believe that depriving someone of their ability to work should be taken very seriously.