Posted by
Donnialda
18 yrs ago
What are the legal reasons an employer could withhold pay without notice?
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You owe tax and Inland Revenue has requested your company to do so.
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Within first year of employment, what percentage of your pay would that be?
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It depends on how much tax you owe and note that IRD can only request your employer do this, your employer doesn't HAVE to comply.
When I say "owe tax", I don't mean your employer withholding a certain percentage of your salary to pay your tax at the end of the year. What I mean is you have received your tax bill and you haven't complied with the payment deadlines and therefore IRD is requesting your employer withhold your pay.
This happened to my husband when he had a dispute with IRD regarding his tax bill some years ago.
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TC
18 yrs ago
Also if your employer has given notice to the IRD that you are leaving HK permanently. The IRD can require the employer to withhold any HKD salary amounts to help cover any final tax liability. Doesn't sound like that applies to you, but I'm going through that right now. They withheld the HKD portion (and I was happy about that seeing mainly that it comprises only a small portion of my salary anyway) and only on Wednesday the IRD came back with a written authority for the withheld portion to be released to me. The main reason for that is they actually owe me - and a cheque is in the proverbial mail!
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Well, I took a leave of absence with full notification of my intent to return, and my employer, without advance notice, decided to withhold my pay until I return. Like because the official contract ends June 30th so they'd only have that one last paycheck to take the taxes out of.
They've also mentioned (threateningly) about cancelling my visa. The stamp expiration date says October 15th, how can they cancel it?
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1. Employers are required to withhold final month's payment if you leave HK for one month (regular biz travel excepted). No notice required as it is the law (they should have told you this because otherwise typically no right to withhold pay in HK). Doesn't matter if you are likely to owe tax or not, the IRD will determine that and then issue the letter of release.
2. Employer does not have an option to chose which parts of the law to follow (sorry turtle), while no jail time for employer but fines and reputational risk (they do issue public announcements re employers who don't comply). Why would they do that for an employee (as an aside, would an employee do that for an employer)?
3. Employers must notify the Imm Dept to cancel your work visa if you are no longer employed (the visa doesn't get cancelled but your right to work does, you can remain in HK till Oct 15, but if you leave you come back as a visitor).
However, if you are taking an agreed leave of absence seems there has been a massive lack of communication/understanding. This assumes you are returning to same employer; if not, seems your employer is on the right track.
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No, it was agreed (though reluctant) leave, but it'll be less than one month. Three weeks actually, and I never gave any notice of intention to cancel my contract, Nor did they advise me of the 30 day stipulation upon being alerted of my leave.
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