In his recent statement, the Chancellor announced a new jobs support scheme which will start on 1 November. The scheme will run for 6 months and replaces the current Coronavirus Job Retention (‘Furlough’) Scheme, which is due to end on 31 October.
The scheme takes inspiration from international schemes such as the German ‘Kurzarbeit’ short-time working scheme. It’s hoped that it will encourage employers to keep people on short-term hours, rather than making them redundant.
Key features of the scheme
- Eligible employees must have been employed as at 23 September.
- Employees must work a minimum of 33% of their normal hours.
- Employees can go on and off the scheme and do not have to work the same pattern each month. But each short-time working arrangement must be for a minimum period of 7 days.
- The Government will cover 33% of usual pay for normal hours NOT worked by employees. This equates to 22% of normal pay. This is subject to a cap of £697.92 per month.
- Employers will be paid in arrears.
- Employees cannot be on a redundancy notice.
- All SME businesses are eligible.
- Larger businesses can apply but they are required to show that their business has been adversely impacted by COVID-19. And the Government has made it clear that it expects such businesses to not make capital distributions (e.g. pay dividends) whilst using the scheme.
- You can use the scheme even if you’ve not used the current furlough scheme.
- Businesses can use the scheme and the Job Retention Bonus scheme.
More information is available in the form of a Government Job Support Scheme Factsheet.
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