Overpayment of Wages

[dancequeen]

Hi, I hope someone can help me with this one?
I worked for a large bank, and handed in my notice in December.....this was given back to me twice (not because they wanted me to stay but wanted bums on seats for the christmas period) In my notice i asked them to advise me when my final working day would be.......so they finally took my notice letter and ........nothing no date given, and as it was coming up to xmas eve (sundsay) felt it morally wrong to collect money!!! so finally chose my own day of finishing. T thus being 22nd of December (notice given orininally the 3rd of December)so I ended my employment and received a letter stating this. I received a payslip in January with zero balance and my P45 (ok so far) I now believe this to be the end of it and now work elsewhere.
Then on the 7th March I receive a letter saying through 'no fault of mine' they have made an error and I owe £245 and i have 7 days to pay it back.
And in 7 days another letter arrives dated 14th saying pay up or else, now i have recieved a solicitors letter dated 22nd march.
question one, they have not given me 7 days from one letter to the next dont you have to give postage and weekend days?
question two do i have to pay it back i was not aware of any overpayment?
Hope someone can help.

[Tango2]

If they've paid you into your bank account via BACS, they can request that you repay the money, but have no right to 'take it out' of your account. Seems they are trying the legal scarey route, but you're under no obligation.

[Mattt]

I believe you can come to some arrangement whereby it is paid back over a period that suits you - hopefully if you asked for this, they might give up.

[GreenV8S]

Are they correct when they say you owe them the money? If so, you do have to repay it and you have to be reasonably prompt about it but they can't impose arbitrary deadlines on you. However, you doing nothing for week after week despite increasingly threatening letters from them is only going to end in trouble.

[justinp1]

GreenV8S said:

Are they correct when they say you owe them the money? If so, you do have to repay it and you have to be reasonably prompt about it but they can't impose arbitrary deadlines on you. However, you doing nothing for week after week despite increasingly threatening letters from them is only going to end in trouble.

Agreed. The Ostrich method only invites problems if the case is genuine. You have every right however to ask them to explain in writing how this overpayment has happened before you pay. Thats what I would do, and put the ball back in their court.

[dancequeen]

Thank you all very much for your replies.