Furloughed workers rights to


The scheme covers full-time, part-time, employees on agency contracts, employees on flexible, fixed term or zero hours contracts as well as apprentices. On 4th April there was an update to the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme guidance which clarified that workers such as Office holders including company directors and salaried members of Limited Liability Partnerships were included as were workers who provide personal services and are not working on their own account and are paid through PAYE. Non-UK nationals can be furloughed by their UK employer. Where you have more than one job, your respective employments will be treated separately for the purposes of furlough and the reimbursement rules apply to each of your employers individually. Company directors will only have the grant applied to their salary and not dividends. The decision to furlough must be considered by the board and formalised as a decision of the company.


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As one of the leading UK specialist employment law firms only acting for employees and senior executives, we are doing our best to help as many people as possible at this difficult time. Please feel free to contact us or phone Please click here to access our main FAQs page for coronavirus and your employment rights.

Please click here to access our main FAQs page for coronavirus and cutting your pay. Please click here to access our main FAQs page for coronavirus and going back to work. Please click here for a full directory of your employment law rights.

Free initial consultation. Read all about us on the home page. The government has announced that the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme CJRS would be extended in order to provide support to businesses and employees until 30th September The support level under the extended scheme mirrors what was available under the CJRS in August Your employer should pay employer NICs and pension contributions.

In addition, flexible furloughing is allowed under the extended CJRS, as well as full-time furloughing. Your employer can still choose to top up your wages above the scheme grant at its own expense if they wish. The government has said that the scheme must be implemented in accordance with existing employment law.

This means that putting you on furlough is a change to your employment contract. In the vast majority of cases, you need to agree to any changes to your contract that your employer proposes. You may have a variation clause in your contract of employment that appears to give your employer wide powers to enforce fundamental changes including a reduction in pay.

The effectiveness of such clauses is very much a grey area in employment law. It is always going to be open to interpretation of the exact wording, and the background circumstances of it being used. It is certainly not a given that it would be reasonable for your employer to rely on such a clause, even if they have reserved the right in your contract.

That said, if your employer is proposing furlough leave which you wish to reject, it is likely that the alternative is going to be a redundancy unless you are too valuable for your employer to lose.

Yes, this is a condition of the scheme and your employer must keep a written record for 5 years. If you have already been furloughed without a written agreement, you may not fall within the meaning of the scheme. Simply put, no. The scheme will only be available where the employer offers it and the employee accepts. Your employer could still choose to top up to full pay but does not have to.

In most cases, if it is necessary to put you on furlough, then it is likely to be in your best interests to accept this, as the alternative is likely to be redundancy. You cannot undertake work for your employer or any organisations linked to your employer such as another group or associate company while you have been furloughed. If you do carry out any work, then your employer may have to repay the grant. HMRC may be conducting audits to check if work is being carried out as this represents a fraud on the system.

Further, HMRC has called for employees to report any abuse of the system by employers who make employees work. On a practical level, if your employer insists that you carry out work whilst you are furloughed, this understandably puts you in a difficult and tricky position. However the fact remains that the whole point about being furloughed is that you should not be working. You can, however, remain fully furloughed. Directors and owner-managers can be furloughed if on PAYE and will still be allowed to carry out statutory duties in these roles, but these are very limited.

Yes you can, if your contract of employment does not have a clause restricting you from doing so. Even if there is such a clause, your employer is able to waive this if they chose do so so. You are not able to be furloughed if you are claiming Statutory Sick Pay because you are ill, or it is necessary for you to self-isolate.

Furlough is possible however, after you are no longer receiving SSP. Also, the government guidance states your employer is free to switch employees from sick pay to furlough and vice versa, although this should not be abused for short term absences. It appears from the government guidance that you are also able to be furloughed if you are still absent, but no longer receiving SSP.

The answer is not clear, but on balance, this appears to be possible when looking at the spirit of the guidance. The position is not clear yet. Either the furlough arrangements will continue unchanged or you could be moved to sick leave and receive only SSP. Yes, the guidance from the government is that this allowable and you do not have to be placed on sick pay. Yes, these will need to be maintained, unless you agree something different with your employer, even though employers are unlikely to be able to claim the cost of these benefits from HMRC.

If your employer offers you permanent health insurance or death-in-service benefits, they should ideally check with their scheme provider about what salary would be used in the event of a claim — would it be normal annual salary or pay during furlough?

Yes, you continue to accrue statutory holiday entitlements, and any additional holiday provided for under your employment contract. The government guidance has made it clear that you are entitled to your normal rate of holiday pay not the reduced furlough rate.

Please click here to access the government guidance on holiday pay during furlough. Yes, it appears that your employer can do this, as the government has now published guidance which supports the view that employers can compel employees to take holiday during furlough. You do, however, need to be provided with the required notice period. This is double the length of the holiday if your employer wishes to require a you to take holiday on particular days.

If your employer has a policy that you cannot take annual leave while you are on furlough, then you would be able to carry over up to 20 days into the next year if you cannot take your full holiday entitlement this year. Your employer is not obliged to put you on furlough instead of making you redundant. Of course, if your employer has told you that you will be made redundant, you can request that you be put on furlough instead, in accordance with the government scheme.

However, your employer does not have to accept this. If you have worked for your employer for more than 2 years, your employer would still be at risk to an unfair dismissal claim should it not follow a fair redundancy procedure, and this includes exploring alternatives to redundancy.

It would, therefore, be reasonable to consider furlough as part of the consultation process. Yes, this may be possible. Your employer could be relying on a clause in your contract allowing for a variation in your terms of employment. It would be this type of variation clause that they would argue enables you to be given the choice of either furlough, or a dismissal for unreasonably refusing to accept furlough as a variation. Whether they can do this would largely depend on what the variation clause says, but it could still be argued that furlough is not something which is reasonable to enforce whether you have variation clause or not.

If you do not want to be furloughed, you should insist that you either your full salary must be maintained or failing that, you should be made redundant and receive the appropriate redundancy payment. No, your employer is liable to pay you full contractual or statutory redundancy.

You could suggest this to your employer as a way to resolve the issue, however there is no obligation on your employer to accept this suggestion. Yes, the furlough scheme specifically allows this if you were on the payroll and stopped working for them after 19 March Your employer may very well agree particularly if the business is likely to recover quickly after the crisis but there is no obligation to do so. You may have already received a redundancy payment, notice pay and other lump sum payments.

It is entirely a matter of agreement between you and your ex-employer on whether you would have to repay any sums already received.

The new law came into force on 31st July As the new regulations come into force on 31 July , any redundancy or notice payments already made before that date will not be covered by the new rules, meaning that employees who have already been made redundant may have missed out.

The guidance clearly says that an employer does not need to place all employees on furlough. It is likely that those who cannot work from home and who currently have no work to do will be obvious candidates for furloughing. Otherwise, employers would probably need to consider a process of calling for volunteers, pooling and selection — as with a redundancy process.

If you think you have been discriminated in the selection process because of a protected characteristic such as race, sex, disability you may have a claim for discrimination.

Yes, your usual contractual notice period will still in in place or in the absence of a contract, then your statutory notice pay of 1 week for every year worked up to a maximum of 12 weeks will apply. These payments appear to apply as normal, but if the employer offers enhanced earnings-related contractual pay for maternity leave this can be claimed as a furloughed wage cost.

The same proposition applies for contractual adoption, paternity or shared paternity. The position is not entirely clear. However it is likely that as the scheme does not affect your entitlements under your employment contract and that you remain employed, your holiday should accrue as normal. Until the government produces further clarification, you should try to agree the full terms for any furlough period to include that your holiday leave remains unaffected.

The government has confirmed that those with certain work visas will not be regarded as breaching their visa conditions if they receive funds under the furlough scheme. You will retain your employment status during the furlough period. At the conclusion, you will have the same rights as you did previously including Statutory Sick Pay entitlement, maternity rights , other parental rights, rights against unfair dismissal and to redundancy payments.

Of course your employer will need to make some difficult decisions about to what extent they need to restructure the business, including of course their staff requirements. Our "1 day policy" concerns the free legal advice service as set out on our free employment law advice page.

This provides certainty for you, so you are not left waiting. In most cases, however, we are able to let you know the same day, and often within hours if we can take your matter forward. We are a leading firm of employment law solicitors, acting for employees and senior executives in the City and throughout the UK. For more information on the coronavirus and a free consultation , please get in contact on and ask to speak to Philip Landau or any member of the employment team, or email us.

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Coronavirus (COVID-19): Post-furlough guide

Find out which employees you can put on furlough and claim for through the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme. You do not need to have previously claimed for an employee before the 2 March to claim for periods from starting on or after 1 May You can claim for employees who are taxed as employees and reported by PAYE, on any type of employment contract. This includes contracts that are:. Foreign nationals are eligible to be furloughed.

Whilst furloughed your employer cannot ask you to do work for another linked or associated company. If your contract allows, you may undertake.

Employees' rights and entitlements

Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites. Below are answers to provide general guidance on some of the most frequently asked questions. The following is provided for informational purposes and is not to be construed as a legal opinion of the Attorney General. We will continue to update this guidance as circumstances may change. The FAQs are available for download here. FLD is unable to offer legal advice to any employer or employee about their particular situation. If you have specific questions or need detailed guidance, we recommend contacting an employment attorney. You can find a lawyer through a local legal services agency or a bar association.


Holiday entitlement, pay and furlough – what are my employees entitled to?

furloughed workers rights to

As one of the leading UK specialist employment law firms only acting for employees and senior executives, we are doing our best to help as many people as possible at this difficult time. Please feel free to contact us or phone Please click here to access our main FAQs page for coronavirus and your employment rights. Please click here to access our main FAQs page for coronavirus and cutting your pay. Please click here to access our main FAQs page for coronavirus and going back to work.

From 31 July , new rules apply to ensure furloughed employees who are made redundant will not be financially worse off merely because they have been furloughed when calculating a week's pay for certain statutory entitlements including statutory redundancy and statutory notice pay. Broadly, the Week's Pay Regulations seek to ensure, for the benefit of furloughed employees whose employment is terminated, that the calculation of statutory entitlements relating to termination is based on their normal pay, rather than their furlough pay.

Employers guide: Ending furlough and requiring employees to return to work

We are continuing to advise on this and all employment law issues and will continue to keep you updated. Call us on Some questions are easy to answer and some less so. We have set out below a number of questions which have been posed to us by clients in real life situations. We will continue to bring you updates as and when available. Question: Can I get funding for workers if they are still working but on reduced hours?


Furlough Back Pay & Notice Requirements: Employee Rights

Under the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme CJRS , the government will make a grant to UK employers to cover up to 80 per cent of the wages of employees whom they continue to pay but who would otherwise have been laid off as a result of the coronavirus COVID crisis. The original version of the scheme ran from 1 March to 30 June and has now been replaced by phase two of the scheme which runs from 1 July to 31 October This new phase is known as "flexible furlough", the principal difference being that, in phase two, furloughed staff are allowed to work on a part-time basis with employers claiming a grant under the scheme for their non-working hours. Employers are also required to bear an increasing proportion of furlough costs from 1 August These are based on:. The employer will also need to have a UK bank account for the grant to be paid into. The scheme applies to any such organisation, including companies, partnerships, not-for-profit organisations, recruitment agencies where agency workers are paid through PAYE and public authorities.

During a furlough, an employee must not perform any work for an employer, including taking calls or checking and answering email. Although you are not entitled.

The End of the Furlough Scheme: Key Considerations for Employers

The pandemic has caused mayhem for businesses around the world. In the UK, the Chancellor has rolled out a furlough scheme that you have probably already implemented. But you will still need to work out, holiday pay and those entitled to leave. The following guide will help employers who have furloughed employees as well as employees who have remained working.


A furlough is a leave of absence with reduced hours and reduced pay. It could last a few hours or several months. Written by the Upsolve Team. This is more likely if you work for a large company. Your employer could decide to extend the date or lay off furloughed employees.

A furlough is a temporary leave of absence for specified employees due to special needs of an employer, which may be due to economic conditions at the specific employer or in the economy as a whole.

Furlough is special leave introduced by the Government to enable employers to retain staff who are unable to work during the pandemic. Employers should continue to pay your normal pay wherever possible. Employers will also be reimbursed for NI contributions and some pension payments. Furlough pay will be subject to tax and National Insurance as normal. You continue to accrue annual leave during furlough and you remain employed by your employer.

On 31 October, the Prime Minister announced a four-week lockdown in England, acknowledging the severe strain that businesses would face in the run-up to Christmas. Chancellor Rishi Sunak followed this with an announcement that the furlough scheme is to be extended until the end of March Employers small or large, charitable or non-profit, are eligible for the Job Retention Scheme. Businesses may apply for grants for payment to staff who have agreed to be furloughed.


Comments: 2
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  1. Abdul-Aziz

    Yes OK. I put it 5.

  2. Xavier

    This is not at all what is necessary for me. Are there other variants?

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