Bitter disappointment for sweet treat maker as it loses a national minimum wage case

Lees the well known Scottish confectionary manufacturer whose products include macaroon bars snowballs and teacakes has lost in an appeal by HMRC to the employment appeal tribunal (EAT) in a national minimum wage (NMW) dispute.

For many years Lees operated a ‘holiday fund’ or ‘savings scheme’ to enable workers to save some of their pay (for holidays Christmas or whatever other occasions or uses they wished to save). Workers could choose to opt in and specify the amount they wished to save per pay period and Lees would then hold back that amount from their wages. Their savings were then paid out to them on request. In some cases the amounts the workers asked Lees to hold back reduced their pay below NMW level.

As the EAT judge acknowledged the intention was benevolent – to assist workers who may not otherwise have been able...