Day 118 - 01 May 95 - Page 27


     
     1        attack on this is if McDonald's do it their way rather than
     2        just paying basic rates and then if you go over 39 hours
     3        paying time and a half, every so often you might expect
     4        they will pay someone less than the minimum for that week
     5        because they are doing it their own way.  That is part of
     6        what I understand you have been putting this morning.  For
     7        all I know in Kirsty Anne Pearson's case there was an
     8        occasion where if you worked it out she had been underpaid
     9        so McDonald's coughed up the £27 odd she was short.  On the
    10        other hand, they might just have thought why do not we pay
    11        her £27 rather than lawyers £500, something of that kind.
    12        It does not actually put the way we are working on the
    13        line.  All it puts is whether we paid beneath the minimum
    14        on this occasion or not.  But there we are. (To the
    15        witness.) The fact is you do not know why the compromise
    16        was reached in this particular case.
    17        A.  I do not know.
    18
    19   Q.   You have no background?
    20        A.  None at all my Lord but just looking at the settlement,
    21        it speaks volumes -- £29.
    22
    23   MR. MORRIS:  In your company's alleged system maybe you could
    24        say where on the pay slips or other company document is
    25        this special provision for paying an additional bonus
    26        equivalent to what the overtime rate might be for someone
    27        who worked more than 13 hours in a week.  Where does it
    28        appear?  Or is scrawled on by hand by a manager?
    29        A.  I am afraid I do not understand what you are asking.
    30
    31   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Well, does it appear at all?
    32        A.  I am not sure what he is asking.
    33
    34   MR. MORRIS:  If I can find a wage.  Do you know where it would
    35        appear in the company records when a manager has decided to
    36        pay, if they do, some extra money because somebody worked
    37        over 39 hours and did not reach the overtime rate they
    38        should have been paid?
    39
    40   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  What is being put to you is the wages -- it
    41        is sometime since I actually received one on an hourly
    42        rate-- but you could very often work out you have so many
    43        hours at X pounds an hour or X0 pence per hour and so many
    44        at another rate.  Then you could see what your gross pay
    45        was before they started taking a large proportion of it
    46        away for one reason or another.  You see here you would
    47        have a calculation, so many hours at X and so many hours at
    48        Y.  It would come to let us say £76.50 a week but the
    49        manager would have worked out that person, if you say what
    50        happens, should be 82 so he has to account for £5.50 on it, 
    51        or someone will think he is putting it in this his own 
    52        pocket.  Do you see? 
    53        A.  Yes.
    54
    55   Q.   Was there any standard procedure to account for the £5.50
    56        that employee might have been short that week but for the
    57        manager's supplement?
    58        A.  No I do not know how they do it.  They would deal with
    59        Payroll Department on that.  They would settle it.  I do
    60        not know how they do it.

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