Money latest: TV star banned from flight over passport issue; 'child-free' pub triggers outrage (2024)

HMRC has overpaid its own staff millions of pounds over the past 10 years, according to The Telegraph.

In total, £12.6m has been pocketed by employees but only £12.3m has been paid back, leaving a £300,000 shortfall.

The news outlet said some 250 staff were overpaid by more than £1,000 last year.

Some of the overpayments were caused by payroll failing to stop salary payments for people who had left the company, it added.

The revelation comes after the tax office controversially decided to close its helplines for six months.

"With a staff headcount of almost 67,500, we operate at a monthlypayroll average accuracy rate of 99.54%, which exceeds the corporate benchmark of 98%," a HMRC spokesperson said.

"Our total pay bill in the 2022/23 financial year was £2.449bn* which means that 0.05% was incorrectly paid that year, and we have recovered over 84% of that.

"We have robust processes in place for the recovery of over and underpayments and all staff are provided with guidance on the importance of checking the payment of their salary."

Asda has become the first UK supermarket to launch an online prescription service.

The Asda Online Pharmacy allows patients to manage prescriptions digitally and have them delivered to their home

All requests will undergo thorough checks by qualified pharmacists before being approved.

From today, new patients can register for the service by visiting pharmacy.asda.com.

Dr Martens has filed a lawsuit against online retailer Temu for allegedly infringing its trademarks, according to The Times.

The British bootmaker has alleged that the online retailer paid Google to advertise boots sold on its site when users search keywords including "Dr Martens", it said.

As a result, Temu's lookalike products were placed about Dr Martens' own in search results.

The move is the latest sign of growing hostility between Western retailers and their cheaper Chinese rivals.

Temu told Sky News it was yet to receive the complaint and will review it in due course.

Tesla is cutting 10% of its global workforce in a bid to reduce costs and bolster productivity, it has been reported.

The electric vehicle maker, founded and run by Elon Musk, was yet to comment on a story earlier today by Electrek that it was to axe about 15,000 people.

The tech publication said the cuts were revealed in an internal memo - also seen by the Reuters news agency.

It added that managers had been tasked earlier this year with identifying key personnel.

The company, which had more than 140,000 staff at the end of last year, has been struggling with soft demand for its electric vehicles.

The average UK tenant is spending 30.6% of their salary on rent, data shows.

Many experts believe that a third of your earnings is considered the outer limit for affordability.

But in several areas of the UK, people are spending considerably more, an index created by Canopy has shown.

Tenants in Poole have been found to be struggling most with affordability, with the average renter giving more than 40% of their income to their landlord.

Stirling has also made a surprising inclusion in the top 10 places, with a low average income meaning tenants are spending 37.8% of their wages on rent.

Belfast was found to be the most affordable major city for renters, with people spending just over a quarter of their salary in rent (23.2%), on average.

Here are the 10 places people spend the highest percentage of their income on rent:

Chris Hutchinson, chief executive of Canopy, said the data showed homeowners spend an average of 18% of their income on their mortgage.

"It is sobering to see that one in five tenants are spending the vast majority of their salary on rental payments, and it neatly encapsulates the tricky situation that many tenants with aspirations of homeownership are in," he said.

"Where we could see positive change is towards longer tenancies for those who desire them, fostering greater security for families and communities."

Up until 1995, children were effectively banned from all public houses in England and Wales, leaving parents with no option but to arrange - and in many cases pay for - alternative childcare if they wished to visit licensed premises.

Among other consequences of this change, legal guardians of all kinds have since been able to avoid such expenses by popping out for a pub lunch, for example, with their respective minors in tow.

However, while it is now perfectly legal for pubs to allow children in, it remains within the power of licensees to forbid the attendance of people under the age of 18.

And while relatively few establishments choose to exercise this right, one such watering hole has sparked a rather intense debate around the issue.

In a post that had been viewed more than 18 million times at the time of writing, a man is pictured next to a sign indicating children (unlike dogs) are not permitted inside an unnamed pub - beneath a message that suggests the post's author approves of the policy.

While some on X expressed support or sympathy for the stance, many others were rather less sanguine.

Among the criticisms was the impact the stance might have on single parents - while others highlighted the financial drain of babysitters that might render a trip to the pub in question impossible for some parents.

The point was made by some users that other licensed premises were available for parents facing such a predicament. Perhaps unsurprisingly though, this seemingly pragmatic observation appears to have done little to quell the anger of those most outraged by the publican behind the child-unfriendly edict.

It's no secret that electrical devices feast on your power supply even if they're in standby mode...

But do you know how much these "vampire devices" are costing you?

Energy expert Stephen Hankison says households could save £131 a year just by switching appliances off at the wall.

The biggest savings can be made from unplugging games consoles, as these can cost you £32 a year on standby.

Gaming PCs (£21), TVs (£14) and desktop computers (£18) are also big drainers.

"It's so simple but switching your appliances off at the wall really is the best way to ensure you’re not spending your hard-earned income on keeping things in standby mode," Mr Hankison, from Electric Radiators Direct, said.

"£130 is a big food shop, two tanks of petrol or even a nice meal out. There really are much better ways to use this money than giving it to the energy companies."

Here's how much your devices are costing you on standby mode:

EasyJet has reminded customers to check their travel documents for damage after Vicky Pattison was turned away from a flight for having a chewed-up passport.

The former reality TV star complained about EasyJet's decision on Instagram, calling the airline the "destroyer of dreams".

The 36-year-old was reportedly trying to fly to Italy to visit a potential wedding venue.

Posting on her Instagram story, she said she had rushed back from Newcastle to be able to get the flight, and was "beyond gutted" to be turned away by staff.

"I've been travelling with my passport all year and no one's said anything, but it's definitely well travelled to be fair. Company policy is company policy and I get it, I'm just beyond gutted," she said.

Reacting to how news outlets have covered the story, she added: "My passport was damaged and I just hadn't realised.

"I am not enraged, if anything I am a tiny squishy sad ball."

An easyJet spokesman told Sky News the airline was sorry for Pattison's experience, but that it is the "passenger's responsibility to have suitable documentation for travel".

"At easyJet, we work closely with the authorities and comply with their guidance to ensure the safety and security of all passengers and staff," he said.

"As such, we cannot allow any passenger to travel on their planned flight with documentation damaged to such a degree that its authenticity is brought into question."

Shoppers have been warned not to eat olives sold by Waitrose over fears they may contain pieces of glass.

The supermarket has recalled its jars of pitted Spanish queen olives, saying they are "unsafe to eat".

"We are recalling a selected date of the above product due to possible glass contamination," it said in an important safety warning notice.

Shoppers have been told to no consume the olives, package up the jar and return it to their local Waitrose for a refund.

"We apologise that it has been necessary to recall this product and for the inconvenience caused," it added.

TV presenter Kevin McCloud has criticised the "broken and dysfunctional" property market, saying it is being monopolised by big housebuilders.

The Grand Designs presenter and designer said Britain was falling behind other European countries such as Germany and Sweden when it comes to housing development.

"If I were the housing minister, I'd be looking at ways to break this monopoly that two or three companies have over the market," Mr McCloud said.

He argued that quality and innovation was being stifled by a lack of competition between developers, which in turn makes the market more sensitive to downturns.

"We have effectively a broken market, a dysfunctional market, it has been hollowed out," he added.

"It means that when we hit difficulty, those companies nosedive and they buy each other out."

By James Sillars, business news reporter

You would think that an attack by Iran on Israel involving more than 300 drones and missiles would drive up oil prices.

While Saturday's strikes failed to land a damaging punch, they have stoked fears of a wider Middle East conflict.

But the financial markets have taken the escalation in their stride.

Oil traders priced in the possibility of such Iranian aggression on Friday, 24 hours beforehand.

As such, a barrel of Brent crude is actually 0.5% down at $90 a barrel.

Analysts say the outlook depends very much on how Israel responds.

Stock market sentiment has taken a slight knock.

In London, the FTSE 100 followed Asia lower. It opened 0.2% down at 7,978.

Energy stocks were the main drag.

In wider UK stocks, car distributor Inchcape climbed 1.6% after it agreed a £346m deal to sell its UK dealership operations to car retailer Group 1 Automotive UK.

The Inchcape UK division consists of 81 sites, employing 3,600 people, and works with car manufacturers including Audi, BMW, Jaguar, Toyota and Volkswagen.

Every Monday we put your financial dilemmas or consumer disputes to industry experts. You can find out how to submit yours at the bottom of this post.

This week,Sky News readerAJ2024asks...

"While on maternity leave my employer rejected my flexible work request and told me to pick from four new shift patterns or take redundancy if they didn't suit me. All new shifts were full working hours. No support as a new mother and ruined my last few precious weeks. What are my rights?"

Katie Wood, senior legal officer at Maternity Action, answers:

All employers have a legal duty to seriously consider all requests for flexible work. This includes any request to change your days, hours or place of work. From April this year, this is a day-one right and you can make up to two requests a year. To show that they have seriously considered a request, an employer is expected to meet with you to discuss the request.

An employer can refuse a request if they have good reasons and it would genuinely be difficult to accommodate a request. There are eight legal reasonsan employer can give for refusing a request but these can be quite broad.

These reasons are:

• The burden of additional costs
• The detrimental effect on the ability to meet customer demand
• The employer is unable to reorganise the work among existing staff
• They are unable to recruit additional staff
• The detrimental effect on quality
• The detrimental effect on performance
• There is not enough work during the periods the employee wants to work
• Planned structural changes

You can ask to appeal a refusal and can also put forward other options. It can help to ask for a trial period or try to find a compromise that would work for both parties.

An employer that insists on a particular working pattern, such as full-time working hours or variable shifts, may be at risk of an indirect sex discrimination claim as it disadvantages women who have more childcare responsibilities than men.

If an employer rejects an appeal, employees should seek legal advice. There is a time limit of three months (less one day) for starting an employment tribunal claim. Employees must contact ACAS to start early conciliation within the time limit. ACAS have more information on rights to ask for flexible work on their website.

This featureis not intended as financial advice - the aim is to give an overview of the things you should think about. Submit your dilemma or consumer dispute, leaving your name and where in the country you are, in the form above or by emailing news@skynews.com with the subject line "Money blog". Alternatively,WhatsApp ushere.