Equal pay - Emily's story

'Last year, the charity I work for was going through some financial difficulties and lots of people were being made redundant. Luckily for me, my boss got another job and left - leaving her post empty.

The job wasn't advertised in the papers. The application pack did not include information about pay or conditions, and I assumed that they would be the same as my boss had had before she left. The salary wasn't mentioned during the interview either, and (probably stupidly) I didn't ask about it. And when I got the job, I was too pleased to think of it!

A week after I had started, I had my first meeting with my new manager. During the meeting, he told me that the salary ‘he had in his head’ was £25,000, which was more than £5,000 lower than my predecessor had been paid. I told him that I was very unhappy with that and explained why it was unfair. I knew they had financial problems but it didn't seem right that they were planning to save money by paying me less than everybody else.

A few days later, I got a letter confirming that my salary would be £26,000. When I called my line manager to complain, he suggested that I meet with someone from HR and said he would set up a meeting. Then I was told that it would be a formal grievance hearing. This was a shock and I nearly pulled out. I had just wanted to talk informally, but they said they wanted me to make a formal complaint.

Men doing a similar job to me got paid more
I wasn't only annoyed that I had thought I was going to be paid more than I was. I was more angry that I was going to be paid a lot less than my male colleagues on the same level.

So I went home and looked on the internet for information about sex discrimination and equal pay laws. I wrote out my complaint, explaining that I was concerned that I had been given lower pay than my male counterparts and that that might be sex discrimination. I named six men on the same level of the management structure as me who I knew were earning loads more than I was.

At the meeting, we discussed my complaint but they didn't agree with any of it. They didn't give me any good reason why I was getting a lower salary. The told me my grievance was rejected, but that I could appeal.

I decided to appeal. I wrote a new letter explaining that I didn't think they'd responded to my complaint properly, they hadn't answered my questions, and that I still thought I was experiencing sex discrimination.

When I went for the appeal meeting, the person from HR suggested that we discuss the matter informally, rather than have a formal appeal hearing. She agreed that a bad decision had been made, and that it seemed to be unfair. She agreed to increase my salary to £30,000. I was delighted.'

April 2008