"Costa Coffee: Employees call £200 deductions for training 'unfair'", 19 August 2019

Costa Coffee employees...claim they have had costs of £200 deducted from their final payslip for training...The BBC spoke to...current and former Costa employees at stores in Essex who say they have also been subjected to other deductions for till discrepancies and running costs.

Costa said contracts for franchise stores are managed by partners. It added some staff contracts did have "clauses relating to deductions"...

...Other complaints about the Costa Coffee stores - run by Goldex Investments Essex Ltd - include allegations over contracts. Six people claim they were never given their written contracts...And two people said they were given "promotions" without contracts, claiming that they were carrying out managerial roles while being underpaid for the work they were doing...

...Costa Coffee said: "We take complaints such as these very seriously and have shared those we've been made aware of with our partner who operates the franchise business to investigate as a matter of urgency."...

Goldex Investments Essex Ltd said it took all the allegations "extremely seriously" and urged employees to outline the issues with their line manager...