September 29, 2020
Employment Law Partner Owen John has set out below what we know so far about the new scheme:
For the first 3 months of the scheme, an employee must work at least 33% of their usual hours. The Government will be considering whether to increase this threshold after 3 months of the scheme being in place.
No, neither the employer nor the employer needs to have previously used the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme in order to benefit from the Job Support Scheme.
All employers with a UK bank account and UK PAYE scheme can use the scheme. It appears that large businesses will need to meet a financial assessment test in order to establish that their turnover is lower now than before Covid-19 struck. There will be no financial assessment test for small and medium enterprises.
All employees who are placed on the Job Support Scheme must have been on an employer’s PAYE payroll on or before 23 September 2020.
The scheme will be open from 1 November 2020 for a duration of 6 months.
The employer must pay for the hours worked by the employee, but for every hour not worked the Government and the employer will each pay one third of the employee’s usual pay. This will ensure employees earn a minimum of 77% of their normal wages. The level of grant provided by the Government will be calculated based on employee’s usual pay, capped at £697.92 per month.
Employers will be able to make a claim online through Gov.uk from December 2020 up until the end of April 2021. Payments will then be made on a monthly basis.
Yes, employees will be able to revert on and off the scheme and there is no requirement for them to be working the same identical pattern each month. However, each working arrangement must cover a minimum period of 7 days.
Workers cannot be made redundant or given notice of redundancy during the period for which their employer is claiming the grant for them.
We will be providing updates on the scheme, as and when further guidance is announced.
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