Job Support Scheme

As announced last week the new Job Support Scheme will be introduced from ‌‌1‌‌ November 2020 to help to protect jobs where businesses are facing lower demand over the winter months due to coronavirus.  The scheme will run for six months to April 2021 and will see the Government contribute towards the wages of employees who are working fewer than normal hours due to decreased demand. 

Employers will continue to fund the wages for the hours worked by employees. For the hours the employee does not work, the employer and the government will each pay one third of their usual wages (capped at £697.92 per month). Examples can be found on the Government’s Job Support Factsheet.

Employers will need to meet their share of the pay for unworked hours together with all the National Insurance and statutory pension contributions

The eligibility criteria for employers is as follows:

• Employer must have a UK bank account and UK PAYE schemes in place before 23 September 2020.
• Large businesses will have to meet a financial assessment test with the scheme will only being available to those whose turnover is lower now than before experiencing difficulties from Covid-19. There will be no financial assessment test for small and medium enterprises (SMEs).
• HMRC will expect large employers using the Job Support Scheme not to be making capital distributions, such as dividend payments or share buybacks, whilst accessing the grant.

Further details of the financial assessment test and criteria regarding the capital distributions will be released with future guidance releases.

Eligible employees must:  

• be registered for PAYE on the payroll on or before 23 September 2020 with an RTI submission notifying payment for that employee must have been made to HMRC on or before 23 September 2020.
• work at least 33% of their usual hours. The minimum hours threshold will be in place for the first three months of the scheme and the Government have confirmed that they will review whether to increase this for the final three months of the scheme.

The Job Support Scheme will commence on 1‌‌ November and you will be able to claim for November in early December. Grants will be paid on a monthly basis.

The existing Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme is completely separate to this new scheme and neither the employer or the employee needs to have previously used the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme.  Further, the Job Support Scheme will operate in addition to the Job Retention Bonus and employers and employees can benefit from both schemes in order to help protect viable jobs. 

For further information please see the Government’s fact sheet.

We are here to help so please contact us if you wish to discuss any of the above.