# repaying maternity benefit



## casper (24 Apr 2007)

I am presently on maternity leave. I have taken my paid mat leave and am currently on my unpaid leave.
I have been receiving my mat benefit and have been topped up by my employer.
Today i got a phone call from the finance dept at work to say that they never deducted the state benefit from my basic salary and that i have to pay them back. they finally agreed that i could pay them back 500 euro/month for 10 months. 
am really annoyed as this is their fault and not mine. we have our house up for sale at the moment and i have to start paying a childminder as well as a current mortgage.
another problem i have is that i was going to hand my notice in when i got back to work and get a job closer to home. am i tied to this company now???


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## my2leftfeet (24 Apr 2007)

So you were getting your full salary plus 280 per week maternity benefit ... did it not strike you that something was wrong? Or did you just think you were entitled to rake it in?

AND ... with your company having topped you up ... you plan to hand in your notice when you get back to work.  In my opinion - people like you ruin it for others. You company may consider themselves shafted and bring in new policy of not topping salary up in future. Imagine if you had had to get by on maternity beneft only as many people who do not have their salary topped up have to.


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## nelly (24 Apr 2007)

yep you seem to be having your cake and eating it. How did you not notice all that extra?

You will be tied to the company I think as it is the same as our company policy as you have discribed and in the "terms and conditions" in our place we must work for i think 6 months before notice or else we have to pay back the employers contributions. Check your company policy.


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## Bronte (25 Apr 2007)

Well done on the baby.  

The OP may have been a BIT too busy what with a new baby and selling a house to notice that she was overpaid.  Her circumstances have changed dramatically for all those of you who forget what having a baby is like.  Now she has to pay a childminder and try and have a job that suits this new lifestyle, that will be in the interest of herself and the child.  Having a child changes one's priorities and rightly so.  The company she's currently working for are not longer numero uno.  

If the 500 Euro repayment is too much why don't you renegotiate to pay back less a month, explaining all the new costs you have.  Or agree to repay them by lumpsum when you sell the house.  As you're moving maybe you could stay with your current employer by purchasing closer to them.  They seem progressive by topping up your salary while you're on maternity so maybe it would be better to stay put.


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## kellysayers (25 Apr 2007)

or you could ask that you take holiday time due to you as unpaid the could save a few payments. Lucky you getting topped up I only got the €285 and had to fight to keep my holidays.


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## Trish2006 (25 Apr 2007)

If you're planning on handing in your notice immediately you get back then they may not require you to work your notice period.  In that case, if your notice is 4 weeks you may be able to use that 4 weeks salary against it with any unused hols, which you should have plenty of.
I'm only back from mat leave since the summer so I know all about how hard it is to concentrate on things other than your new first baby.  BUt I have to say, there is absolutely no way that I wouldn't notice an extra €1200 in my account every month.  Especially since I took all my unpaid so we had kept an eye on our finances so that we could afford that luxury.
As for the company getting shafted, I don't agree there, they could easily have a clawback clause to deal with people not returning.  If I left within 6 mths of returning, I had to repay all the topups, if between 6mths and 1 year, then half the topups.  I had to sign an agreemnet before they'd pay me anything.  This is an incredibly simple, fair system and a company who doesn't implement something similar is implying that they don't mind if people don't return.  Not everyone who doesn't return plans it that way, sometimes people have no choice.


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## my2leftfeet (25 Apr 2007)

Trish2006 has a point - your company may already have a policy in place whereby they can claw back the top up they gave you. But you would probably have had to agree to this before going on maternity leave.

I am open to correction but I don't think any such policy is enforceable?

If a company tops up a salary, I see it as a "gesture of good faith". An appreciation of the employees input to date and an expectation that they will return to work. I can't honestly see how they wouldn't mind if the employee did not return. 

I am currently on maternity leave, my salary has been topped up by my company, I pay back the maternity benefit each week to the company ... it was very easily set up through my bank account. I was not asked to sign any agreement by my company but, because I appreciate their gesture, I would have no intention of looking for another job before I am back at work for 12 months.

Like Trish - there is no way i would not notice an extra 280 per week going into the bank ... new baby or not.

I do feel pretty strongly about this - because I have seen situations where employers have felt shafted where employees take the top up and then resign on their return. Big corporates probably don't feel the pinch as much as small companies do.  I have seen one small company change their policy on topping up after experiencing this - because it is a big commitment from a company point of view.


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## nelly (25 Apr 2007)

i don't know if you would have had to see the policy before hand and signed anything before. There are policys in work which i can look at if i want and have never signed but are still enforced by the company. Paying back the lump sum would be the best method it seems for you when your house sale comes through.


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## casper (25 Apr 2007)

Thanks for all the replies and yes i feel so stupid about not noticing this extra money but TBH i rarely check my account. we have just been saving and saving for the move. think i got quite a big shock when she said i owed over 5000 euro.
i work in a large hospital where i work a full week of nights every 6 weeks or less and every second weekend. my employers are not very understanding.
also due to unforeseen circumstances, we will be moving to a house about 40 miles from where we are at the moment so commuting to and from work is an issue considering i don't drive.
will check out the policy in the meantime.


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## ~michelle~ (5 May 2007)

Remember if they are taking 500 per month back from you it is taken before tax and prsi, as maternity benefit is not taxable, so while your gross pay will be down 500 your net pay will only be down 265 after tax assuming the higher rate of tax.


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## MsGinger (6 May 2007)

~michelle~ said:


> Remember if they are taking 500 per month back from you it is taken before tax and prsi, as maternity benefit is not taxable, so while your gross pay will be down 500 your net pay will only be down 265 after tax assuming the higher rate of tax.


 
I don't think this is correct, the OP has already received the tax-free benefit of their maternity pay, so any overpayment should come out of net salary.


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