A1CS X220 Tablet

Question by Tom: If I am owed money, is it illegal to hold on to company property if I no longer work for the company?
I had to leave my last job as the company stopped paying their employees. I have 2 month’s salary owed to me which I am currently taking action in the Employment Tribunal to recover. As I worked from home, I have quite a bit of company IT equipment in my home. I offered to do a handover before I left but this was declined by my employer, and they insisted that my resignation was effective immediately once I handed in my notice.

They are now, 3 weeks after my resignation, trying to get all their IT equipment back and telling me I need to arrange for it to be delivered back to their office. They still owe me around £5,000 in unpaid wages, but are threatening to involve the police if I do not return the equipment. I have 2 iPads, an iPhone, a laptop and 10 generic tablet computers.

I don’t feel like it should be my responsibility to have to go out of my way to return their kit seeing as though I no longer work for them, but I might be persuaded to do so if they actually paid me what they owe! Does anyone know where I stand, legally speaking, in this situation?

Best answer:

Answer by Lauren
Yes it is theft, but they also owe you money. So if they go to the police, they’ll only be told to give you the wages, or let you keep any items up to the value of what they owe you.

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