Timescale for paying back monies paid incorrectly

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paddi22

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My sister is working for a large multinational and has been having trouble dealing with them for the last few months. She is currently heavily pregnant and has been signed off by the work doctor for the last few months due to a lot of health problems that posed a risk to her pregnancy. The company have been paying her during this time.

They called her in recently and told her that she actually owes them over 9000 due to being paid in error (there is a maximum number of sick weeks you can be paid in a two year scale and she was off with a back illness last year). They suggested she paying back over the course of a year. They blamed her for not reading the policy about sickpay.. but she doesn't have a copy.. and assumed since they were aware of her illness they would be aware she was still being paid (she was constantly sending in doctors letters etc)

She can't afford to pay in back in that time frame as she will be very stuck for money with the new baby. She has no problem paying back what she owes but she wonders if in cases like that :

1. Do companies ever make good will gestures of reducing the amount due to the fact it was their error and went unnoticed for so long?

2. Can they dictate the time frame or can she argue for a longer timescale that she could comfortably manage?

She is worried enough about her health problems and has now got the fright of her life and panic over paying this money back when she can least afford it. Any help would be greatly appreciated as she can't afford to get legal help over it.
 
Number of things she needs to consider here

Yes your employer can ask for funds back paid in error. Number of other things she needs to consider
Firstly are the tax implications, are the asking her to pay back the amount pre tax or post tax. The tax man is unlikely to give a rebate for something like this
Secondly has she been claiming her sick pay from the social welfare and is this included in the calculation, many employers deduct this from their sick pay
 
Hey, just actually heard from her now about that.

Yeah social welfare has been paid into her account and she has been chasing her company to get details to transfer it across to them as the social welfare won't send cheques directly to them. So she still has that money to give to them. So they are willing to deduct that to give a figure of roughly 6000. They are 'happy to accept' 100 euro a week to pay it off in a year. There is no way she can afford this. She would struggle to even pay 20 euro a week i think.

Mpsox, that is a good point about the tax. I'l get her to check it.
 
As the employer neglected to issue the correct policy they have to take a bit of responsibility - Blaming your sister beggars belief! She should write to them outlining the situation - something like what you originally posted and tell them she able to pay back so much a month. If they get stroppy she should go third party.
 
I came across a situation where a company overpaid staff Sunday and bank holiday rates. It was agreed with the staff that it be paid back over a 3-4 year period.

One thing to note, she could offer to pay some of it back with her holidays, ie ten days holidays is equal to ten days gross pay, this can knock a sizeable chunk off the amount owing without costing her. Also, she could offer to work a half hour extra per day to pay it back over a shorter period.
 
You must be given your statutory holiday entitlment in the form of time off. Payment for holidays is only allowable at the end of a contract.
 
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