The furlough scheme has once again been extended, this time to the end of September 2021. There will be no change to the terms for employees but the scheme will return to a tapered arrangement for employers from the summer. Flexible furloughing is permitted, as well as full-time furloughing.

This means the Government will continue to pay 80% of wages up to a monthly cap of £2,500 until 30 June, with employers covering Employer NICs and pensions. From 1 July this will reduce to 70% up to a cap of £2,187.50 and from 1 August to 30 September 2021 the government will pay 60% of wages up to a cap of £1,875, with the employer topping up the amounts so the employee continues to receive the 80%.

To be eligible, employees must have been on an employer’s PAYE payroll by 30 October 2020, with an RTI submission being made in respect of that employee on or before that date. Importantly, neither the employer nor the employee needs to have previously claimed under CJRS to claim under extended CJRS.

Employees employed as of 23 September and notified to HMRC by RTI on or before that date, who have since been made redundant, can be rehired and placed on the scheme.

Changes to working hours must cover a period of at least a week and be confirmed to your employee in writing.  There are no minimum or maximum hours that they must work and there is no minimum time that you must furlough staff for.

Claim Errors

If an error has been made in a claim that has resulted in an overclaimed amount, this must be paid back to HMRC.

HMRC can now be told about overclaimed amounts as part of the next claim. When making the claim you will be asked whether you need to adjust the amount down to take account of a previous error. The new claim amount will be reduced to reflect this.

For those who will not be submitting future claims, a payment must be made to HMRC using your 14 or 15 digit payment reference number that begins with X. HMRC must be contacted to obtain your reference number. Details of how to pay can be found using the following link: https://bit.ly/2BfNbhN

If an error has been made that has resulted in an underclaimed amount then you should contact HMRC and they will conduct additional checks.

We await further detailed guidance from the Government and will update this information as and when we have the details.