HR at my new job just sent me an email saying that I am a volunteer. I've been working here two months under the impression that it's paid work

Question

I started a part-time software development job two months ago. The company I work for has roughly 50% volunteers, but the position I applied for was paid (I still have a copy of the job advertisement).

I asked a question about how I should submit my time sheets to get paid, and they replied, "As your project is non-paid, you will not be required to submit time sheets each month".

Hopefully this is just a mix-up at payroll, but I sent a reply asking them to double check and that I wont be able to continue working if it's on a volunteer basis.

The problem is that any communication with payroll takes an unreasonable time to go through. Their reply to my question took 3 weeks and all my other contact with them has taken similarly long (hence why I've been working for two months without receiving payment yet).

How should I proceed? It's been a day since I sent the email asking them to double check and I haven't had a reply. I'm hesitant to go into work if there's a chance I wont be paid. If they do insist I'm working on a volunteer basis how can I go about getting payment for these past two months (UK)?

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Update: I've contacted my supervisor about it. He confirmed that he thinks I should be paid, and payroll confirmed that I'm not down to be paid on their list. I'm escalating to try and get this resolved but the director has gone on leave until Monday and isn't answering calls.

Answer 1

Like Kozaky said, check your contract. Any paid position would have involved signing an official job offer that would have specified your salary. Find that document and read it again to make sure you know what it actually says.

If there's no mention of being paid a specific amount of money, then the fault is unfortunately probably on you. Give your notice, pack your things and move on. (I would still recommend giving two weeks, or whatever's customary, just to try your best not to burn bridges.)

If there IS mention of a salary, then take that document to HR. Send an email first (it's probably wise to maintain a paper trail) but if they haven't gotten back to you by the end of the day, go knock on some doors. I say "doors" (plural) because you should probably rope in your immediate supervisor and see what they have to say about this. One way or the other, get it straight.

If your contract says it's a paid position and they still refuse to pay you, then you'll probably have to get a lawyer involved, but hopefully it won't go that far. Two months of work is probably a sizable amount of money they owe, but weigh that against any legal fees that you'll incur pursuing them over it. And also, of course, give your notice. Don't continue working for them if they aren't at least willing to admit there's an issue to be addressed here.

Edit:

The OP has mentioned in comments that he had a verbal agreement during the interview process, though his contract doesn't explicitly highlight which salary position his job is eligible for.

A verbal agreement can still be considered binding in most countries (I think, IANAL) but it would be an uphill battle to say the least. When speaking to HR about this issue, it would definitely help if you could get the original interviewer on record in support of your position (ideally in writing, as before, paper trails are good). MAYBE they'd be willing to revise your contract and correct the issue, if everyone involved outside of HR agrees on what was supposed to happen.

It's not a great position to be in, but it's worth a shot - it's not like you have much to lose, since you've already stated you don't intend to stay if you aren't getting paid. If it comes down to a legal battle, as Rath says below, you might be able to convince a judge you wouldn't have accepted the position if you had known it was unpaid.

Answer 2

How should I proceed?

This is not an issue that you should have to resolve on your own. Ask your manager to step in and help you get this fixed. It shouldn't take 3 weeks, 3 days, or even 3 hours for him/her to tell the HR folks in no uncertain terms that yours is a paid position and they need to pay you your back wages straight away.

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Update: From your comment, you've now established that your manager intended for you to be paid, but that the payroll department somehow never got that message. I say again that this is a problem that your manager should resolve on your behalf and as quickly as possible, and if he hasn't already offered to step in, you should ask him to do that.

If you must be involved, try to work with the payroll folks rather than against them. Their job is to get the checks out to the right people and in the right amounts based on the information they're given, so try to find out what should have happened between the moment you were hired and now in order for you to get paid. You're not looking to point fingers, but something went wrong somewhere in the hiring process and you need to get it fixed. Let them know that you understand that they're just following their process, and that your goal is to work with them to resolve the issue. Once you know what information they should have received and from whom, you can follow that trail and make sure that the responsible parties do what it takes to get you a check.

Answer 3

You have loads of rights on this issue in the UK, don't worry.

If you have no immediate joy with your line manager, go to your nearest Citizens Advice Bureau - it's what they're there for.

Answer 4

When you negotiate it might help to mention that you never intended to work as a volunteer and unpaid, so if they insist that you were a volunteer then you insist that any code you created is yours and yours only and needs to be removed from any machine they own.

Answer 5

Get to the local advice bureau/lawyer. Take the ads and any written material. Don't engage in verbal negotiations from this point onwards.

If this is your only job then you might be able to prove that you thought you were in for a paid career path. If the group is known for using volunteers or unpaid interns then you will need to establish to legal level why you thought your case is different from the volunteers. This is an issue that will come up in the legal battle. If you can establish a strong case (either from your great previous reputation or that you've previously been self-employed and have established work) then it is very likely they'll pay you out.

What you're up against, is that there is a shady history of people joining up to volunteer organisations, whose managers are often untrained and non-professional (ie under resourced and often volunteers themselves) and the shady people join the organisation and start working. The managers are happy, thinking that they've got a volunteer. Then a certain time down the track the shady person says "where's my paycheck". Because the unprofessional manager wasn't formally hiring (and not professional competent) they never properly formalised the paperwork. Which puts the whole organisation at a risk. Normal process is to fully vet and process employees, but poor managers often fail to do that with volunteers as the volunteers aren't seen as formally part of the team/company. The shady people take advantage of this.

Now what you have to do is prove that you genuinely thought you were in a paid position. (which considering no wages yet...will be hard.) You will have to prove that such long periods (eg monthly wage) are not uncommon in your industry. You can also use the HR delay as evidence that you've tried to ratify things, and that you can't just "stop work" for 3 weeks until HR get sorted out. Another common failing of companies that use interns or volunteers, is that HR is legally bound to very tight rules for employees, but those rules do not apply for people giving away their labour (can't be bound by Contract Law on gifts or promises as by definition a contract is two sided consideration but a gift is one sided). This is another angle that the shady people use to their advantage: that unpaid employees are poorly monitored and have no importance with respect to employment contracts or legal responsibilities - leading to exactly the situation you're in.

In my country, you'd be breaking the law, as all employment requires written contracts that are legally required to have certain information including but not limited to pay rate, annual and sick leave, maternity leave, and primary responsibilites. Both "employee" and employer are legally liable if this doesn't happen.

In your situation, you have to prove you're not just some shady person taking advantage of a volunteer based organisation. To do that, you need to know the legal tests that are applied in court in your location. And that is only available from Citizens Advice Bureau, Lawyers, or a lot of personal legal research.

Answer 6

Is it possible that this is a just a misunderstanding of their email? The phrasing was quite strange as they said the project was unpaid, not you.

Maybe they mean that the company isn't being paid on a cost-plus basis for the work.

Answer 7

You might consider asking this question at law.stackexchange.com. This sounds like it's beyond just job-place etiquette norms. You should know what your legal rights are and you might get a good advice from someone who knows something about the law there. I know you asked about the UK, but in the US (for example) this kind of situation is unlikely precisely because the legal penalties for not paying your employees on time usually outweigh the full amount of money which is due to them. You should find out if UK is similar. If it is, then the company would be on the hook financially as soon as you made 1 phone call. But you should really find out what your legal rights are if you are being stiffed before pressing on with it.

Answer 8

As there are two different perspectives not options, both with the same proper action it seems straight forward:

1. if you a volunteer, and don't want to be, quit until they hire you.
2. if you're not a volunteer and haven't been paid and they owe you, send a letter saying you have to stop work until you get paid.

Additional options: Take all your work with you, if they want it they'll pay you. If they don't like that enough to take action, that leaves you recourse to counter action and a third party decision that demands you get paid. Keep all documentation. Beats striking wearing a sandwich board sign on the sidewalk outside their offices. (Really you had to ask?)

And is your pay for two months supposedly enough for legal recourse? Probably not enough to hire one who's only going to think you slow and take your money, so you have to file pro se yourself in small claims. They might not hire you, but they might pay you off to save themselves the effort of having to appear, as you probably cost less than it would for them to fight it, but don't imagine they'd look forward to hiring you if they can line up the rubes to do the same.

lesson of the day, a real software company paying is going to have a slew of contracts to sign including pay scale, expectations, non-disclosure and confidentiality (which means they don't have any guarantee that you won't simply copy and proliferate what they have, which means you're working for an open source and probably charitable organization, which means you should suck it up, put it on your resume and move on instead of using either of those options, ask for a glowing reference letter instead.