Reversal of Fortune

Well, it's been a week of two halves, with a decidedly crappy first half gradually giving way to something more positive.  The first part of the week was dominated by an encounter with a new underarm antiperspirant that proved  extremely painful.  Basically, I suffered an allergic reaction which left me feeling that my armpits were on fire.  It took the better of a day for the discomfort to subside, aided by repeated underarm scrubbings in an attempt to get the stuff off of my skin.  Days later, there is still some irritation - in fact, the bloody stuff has left what look like chemical burns on my inner upper arms.  Anti-septic cream helps ease the pain, though.  As does a bit of unexpected news I received yesterday.  Cast your mind back a long way and you might recall me mentioning here about how my previous employer, several months after I had left them, came back demanding money from me because, allegedly, I had been overpaid.  There was no explanation of how I'd supposedly been overpaid, (the very idea that they could overpay any of their employees on their pay rates was laughable), but I eventually found that they were claiming that I hadn't been entitled to several periods of paid leave I'd taken prior to my departure.  I disagreed, pointing out that my then line manager had signed them off, which he wouldn't have done without double checking my leave entitlement.  After much too-ing a fro-ing, threats of being taken to court, formal complaints and so on, they finally conceded that they'd never checked with said line manager and finally agreed to do so before taking any further action.  After which, I heard no more from them.

Fast forward some two and a half years - to Wednesday this week - and, out of the blue, I receive an email from the buggers.  Guess what?  It turns out that I never owed them any money as my elusive line manager, (who they tried to blame for the delay in getting back to me, as they couldn't contact him - in reality he had simply moved to a different department, the real reason for the delay, I suspect, being that the issue had been filed away and forgotten about for a couple of years), had confirmed that I was entitled to all the leave I had taken.  (Something, obviously, that they should have checked in the first place).  In fact, as it turns out, they owe me money.  Apparently, not only was I entitled to that leave I'd taken, but there were several days of my leave allowance still outstanding, as I'd never taken them before leaving and that they should have 'bought' from me when I left.  So, I'm looking forward to my small (but still significant) windfall being paid out in time for Christmas.  While my issues with my former employer have been resolved with a positive (for me) outcome, I'm still left bothered by the idea that there are probably plenty of other former employees out there being badgered for 'overpayments' they might not actually owe.  How many of them, who aren't as sure of their facts and as down right bloody minded as me, have been brow beaten into paying up money they might not owe?  Because the letters they send out are pretty aggressive, stating everything as written-in-stone fact and threatening legal action if you don't pay.  They don't give any proper explanation of their calculations or any mechanism for contesting their claims.  Moreover, as I found, they will try to ignore any correspondence from you, simply sending out more threatening form letters.  You have to stand firm and be persistent: I had to make a complaint and threaten counter legal action against them for harassment before they'd acknowledge my correspondence.

I really think that this whole issue of employers chasing ex-employees for alleged overpayments of salary needs to be looked into by someone at a higher level.  As my personal experience has demonstrated, much of it seems to be them chancing their arm and seeing if they can harass you into paying based purely on their word that you owe them money.  It's clear that their calculations are based upon the most cursory of 'checks' and that when they are forced into a proper investigation, the situation ends up being reversed.  Maybe I should be writing to my new Labour MP, (the notoriously pro-Tory local paper is still smarting from this constituency electing anything other than a Tory in its history, running all manner of rather pathetic anti-Labour stories), in the hope that, unlike his useless Tory predecessor he might raise the issue with the relevant authorities.