Argos repays £2.4 million to 37,000 staff


Catalogue retailer Argos is to provide back pay to 37,000 current and former store employees after they were found to have been paid below the statutory National Living Wage rate prior to December 2016.


The affected employees will receive a back-dated payment on 28 February 2017 to cover the unpaid wages. The back pay amounts to approximately £64 per employee, totalling almost £2.4 million.


The underpayment was discovered during a routine HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) investigation following Sainsbury’s acquisition of Argos last year. The cause of the underpayment was found to be related to the timings of colleague briefings, which often occurred before an employee’s shift started, and due to security searches, which could happen after an employee’s shift had finished.


Argos has since introduced new processes to avoid a repeat of the issue. In addition, Argos has proposed to give most Argos store staff a 2% pay increase, and increase the basic rate of pay for some staff aged over 25-years-old from £7.20 an hour to £7.66 an hour.


www.employeebenefits.co.uk/issues/february-online-2017/argos-back-37000-underpaid-staff