Elon Musk's X is demanding former employees to return their pay

X is reportedly coming after its former employees for being allegedly overpaid through currency conversion between the US and Australian dollars.

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The Sydney Morning Herald reported that laid-off Australian X workers received an email from Elon Musk's social media platform requesting that they return entitlements that were overpaid to them. The former employees received emails from X's Asia Pacific human resources department, which stated there was a "significant overpayment in error in January 2023". Notably, the company is requesting anywhere between $1,500 and $70,000 for each employee.

As you can probably imagine, a total number of zero employees have paid back the requested amount, according to the Sydney Morning Heral. More specifically, X said the overpayment is related to the "deferred cash compensation" that occurred when the company issued employees shares when the employee joined then-Twitter. "These shares were valued at $US54.20 ($82) each, the price at which Musk bought Twitter in 2022, and the total number of shares acquired by an employee was based on the length of their tenure at the company."

It appears X made currency conversion errors when "employees were paid their entitlements once they were made redundant... According to one account, X paid out the share entitlements at a conversion rate 2.5 times the value of the shares."

Reports indicate X has requested former employees pay back a portion of their entitlement "at your earliest convenience".

Employment law specialist Hayden Stephens spoke to ArsTechnica and said former X employees should be prepared to repay the alleged overpayment but should first "ask X to clearly explain how the error occurred and ask for supporting documentary evidence."