Finance director David Clark said that, while some could be due thousands, others would get “only pennies”, and some nothing.

Many former staff have been waiting for four years for the settlement, at the back of the queue behind existing staff involved in the Agenda for Change programme, most of whom have now received the money due.

Around 5000 retired staff and people who have moved on to jobs outwith NHS Tayside are about to be approached regarding back pay due to them as a result of the process that has assessed the job description and associated pay bands of every Scottish health service employee in Scotland, apart from doctor.

In Tayside, around 14,000 current staff have been involved in the lengthy negotiations, but deadlines have come and gone. But today, health bosses at NHS Tayside’s strategic policy and resources committee in King’s Cross Hospital, Dundee, were given a report suggesting the end of the process is in sight.

Just 35 current employees have still to go through the process of assimilation on to their new pay grades.

“The assimilation of substantive staff is now materially complete,” said acting director of human resources George Docherty. “With regard to payments of arrears, that exercise is near materially complete.”

The outcomes of the new pay gradings were being challenged in relation to 1082 posts, but 260 of these have now been dealt with. A further 540 posts in this group have been through a “pre-assessment process” with a view to reaching a satisfactory outcome.

For the first time, Mr Docherty was able to indicate “leavers” were reaching the head of the queue, though it will be October before he sets out a “timeline” for processing and paying the 5000.

National negotiators had agreed current staff would be dealt with before amounts due to leavers would be calculated and paid out, meaning retired staff and others had no indication of when they could expect to receive the cash due to them.

Mr Docherty said he would present a timeline for that work to the committee in October.

Following the meeting, he said he understood that ex-employees were eager to know when they could expect the cash in hand but he was not in a position today to give an indication of that.