National Living Wage Set To Rise on 1st April 2021

Every year, the National Living Wage (NLW) and National Minimum Wage (NMW) are set to rise from the 1st April. The new rates will be:

• NLW (age 23+) £8.91 per hour

• NMW (age 21-22) £8.36 per hour

• NMW (age18-20) £6.56 per hour

• NMW (age16-17) £4.62 per hour

• NMW apprentice rate £4.30 per hour

If you pay any employees the NLW or NMW, or close to it, it’s a good idea to check their current pay now to see what adjustments you need to make ready for April.

Other Important Rises From 4th April 2021

Other important rises include:

• Statutory sick pay, which will rise to £96.35 per week;

• Statutory maternity, paternity, adoption, parental bereavement, and shared parental payments will rise to £151.97 per week.

If this is written into your policies then don’t forget to amend them ready for the 4th April.

The Step-Up Programme: Offering fully funded internships

Step-Up is a new internship and training programme for SMEs where you can access talented graduates to help sustain and grow your business through fully funded graduate internships.

Harris HR is delighted to be involved in this fantastic programme - we are delivering specialist master classes covering ‘Internship On-boarding’.

The Step-Up Programme is hosted by the University of Brighton and the University of Sussex and covers the Coast to Capital Local Enterprise Partnership area (Brighton and Hove, London Borough of Croydon, Gatwick Diamond, Lewes and West Sussex).

What the Programme offers to you

Joining the Step-Up programme will give you a fully funded graduate intern for six weeks in summer 2021, plus access to specialist master classes hosted by subject and industry experts – all at no cost to you.

To find out more Click Here

Register by March 2021

The programme is funded by the universities of Brighton and Sussex, and the European Social Fund. There is no cost for organisations to attend the workshops or host an intern.

Furlough Scheme extended to March 2021

The Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme has been extended until March 2021 with employees receiving 80% of their current salary for hours not worked.

Businesses will have flexibility to bring furloughed employees back to work on a part time basis or furlough them full-time.

The furloughed employee or worker must have been on the employers PAYE payroll and included in a 'Real Time Information' (RTI) submission to HMRC on or before 30 October.

Full details will be published on 10 November 2020.