A chef who had unlawful deductions made from her wages has been awarded nearly £4,000 by an employment tribunal.

Karena Thewlis worked for No 19 Limited when the company operated the restaurant at Castletown Golf Club.

The company no longer runs the restaurant at the club.

Mrs Thewlis had worked for the company since 2016 as a chef and occasionally covered as front of house when other staff had days off.

She worked on a zero hours basis, but had not been provided by any terms and conditions of employment until shortly before the termination of her employment in 2019 when she received her three months notice, due to expire on the final day of business on July 31, 2019.

The tribunal panel, chaired by Douglas Stewart, said in its report: ’The evidence suggested the owners of the golf club had terminated the respondent’s right to run the restaurant/catering side of the facilities so that the concept of redundancy was genuine.’

cancelled

A meeting was organised by director of the company Mr Halsall, who said he would pay Mrs Thewlis cash in hand for the work done up to July 31. However, he twice cancelled and then went on holiday for two weeks.

While on holiday, he text Mrs Thewlis confirming he would pay her the balance owed when he returned from his holiday.

When she checked this on August 19 2019, he said he would send it later on the week.

Mr Halsall later paid £256 into Mrs Thewlis’s bank account, with him not disputing the shortfall of £61.50 owed to her at the tribunal.

Mrs Thewlis was in June 2019 presented with a contract to sign after Mr Halsall had been advised to do so by his advocate.

The tribunal report said it ’seemed clear that there was something of a panic to get the paperwork in order because of an inspection by a government department of the records’.

sign

She was told to sign the document, but was not given a copy of it.

It indicated a rate of pay of £9 for front of house work and £12.25 for kitchen work, however Mrs Thewlis said she was never paid more than £12 per hour.

Further arguments put forward by both sides over a potential resignation by Mrs Thewlis in 2018 due to ill-health.

But the tribunal ruled there was ’no persuasive evidence’ for this.

The tribunal also ruled that it was not possible to prove Mrs Thewlis had worked for the company before August 2016.

However, it was satisfied that she had began working there by October 2016, meaning she had two years of complete service.

As a result of this, she was awarded two weeks wages at a total of £770.62, plus four extra weeks (£1,541.24) due to the failure to provide her with written terms of employment, which is in breach of the Employment act 2006.

The tribunal also ordered Mr Halsall to pay Mrs Thewlis the outstanding £61.50 owed to her, as well as a further two weeks wages (£770.62), equalling £832.12. In total, the tribunal awarded her £3,914.60.