The litigation surrounding holiday pay continues to rumble on. In the latest decision, the EAT has held in Fulton -v- Bear Scotland Ltd 2017 that a gap of more than three months between on-payment or underpayments of wages is sufficient to break the series of deductions, for the purpose of bringing an unlawful deduction from wages claim. This confirms the decision reached by the EAT in 2014.
Following the decision in 2014, the case was remitted to the tribunal to apply the law to the facts. The tribunal did so, and excluded claims where more than three months had passed between underpayments. The claimants appealed on the basis that the earlier ruling on this had been obiter dicta i.e. not a binding part of the decision. This led to the most recent case, in which the EAT ruled that it was bound by the earlier decision and the tribunal had been correct to exclude claims with a break of three months or more.