Adderbury Stores in Adderbury High Street, not far from Banbury, was visited by Immigration Enforcement earlier this year.
It is understood enforcement officers found an Indian man working there who had no right to work and took him away.
The government has published a list of businesses, including Adderbury Stores Ltd, across the country that were visited by Immigration Enforcement between January and end of March this year.
Adderbury Stores in Adderbury high street (Image: Matt Simpson)
Adderbury Stores Ltd, the limited company for Adderbury Stores, was later issued a £40k fine for employing an illegal worker.
However, the company’s director Pardeep Bansal has insisted she was not aware of the employee’s immigration status.
“It is not my fault,” Mrs Bansal told this newspaper outside of her shop.
The 56-year-old Indian national claimed that when she employed the unnamed Indian man, who was a student, his right to work and visa was all in order.
However, her husband Davinder said that “unknown to us [he] applied for asylum, which we now know had curtailed his right to work”.
Mrs Bansal said ‘her accountant has all the proof’ that is needed to prove the immigration status was valid when he got the job.
Adderbury Stores in Adderbury high street (Image: Matt Simpson)
When asked to see proof of this, Mrs Bansal did not provide any documents as evidence.
“The day Immigration Enforcement came round to the shop, I was going to Canada,” she said. “They rang me and said I had an illegal worker here.
“When I employed him, he had proof of his right to work. I had a copy of this. I gave him his payslips, I have nothing to hide.
“This has all been given to my accountant now.”
Said she had to cancel her two-week trip to Canada and did not get refunded for the £700 spent on flight tickets.
“Immigration Enforcement then took the man away and the shop was closed,” she added.
“It left my customers upset. Everybody in Adderbury knows him and loves him. I have looked after him; he is a good worker.
“I am not appealing… yet. My solicitor has the proof.”
Mrs Bansal said that the former worker is now going back to India, but that in conversations since she told him that “all the village will help him and that he is loved”.
Adderbury Stores in Adderbury high street (Image: Matt Simpson)
She added: “But he should have told me his visa has been cancelled, if this is the case. I had his visa when I employed him, but it is not my fault if it has been cancelled and I wasn’t told.”
Records show there is now an active proposal to strike off Adderbury Stores Ltd from the register.
Meanwhile, her husband Davinder Singh Bansal, 74, is the director of a newly formed company for Adderbury Stores called DD Store Ltd.
The old limited company “was not making a profit”, she said with her husband saying it became insolvent, and so a new company was set up.
Setting up a new limited company does not automatically wipe out old debts unless the previous company goes through a formal, legal insolvency process like liquidation or administration.
Mr Bansal added: “This case I am sure you will agree is starkly different to an employer employing an illegal worker deliberately.”
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