Payroll news
Payroll news
PAYR LL NATIONAL WEEK 2019 2-6 September #NPW19
Savings scheme breaches NMW rules ACCORDING TO economia (https://bit.ly/2RDqs1f), the frozen food retail chain Iceland is apparently facing a bill of £21,000,000 in respect of breaches of national minimum wage (NMW) rules mainly arising because of deductions made from employees’ wages in respect of a Christmas savings scheme the employer has been operating for many years. Once the sums of money for the scheme are deducted from an employee’s pay, what is left is technically below the NMW. Even though the deductions are voluntary, and the deducted amounts are ring-fenced in a separate bank account controlled by an independent trustee company, and the staff can get their money back in its entirety at any time, HMRC asserts that the scheme breaches NMW rules. Sir Malcolm Walker, Iceland’s founder and chief executive, has apparently called HMRC’s action “just madness” and said he would be fighting the claim through the courts if necessary. In a statement, Iceland said that it was “somewhat irked at being pursued at potentially huge cost for a technical breach of the minimum wage rules over a voluntary deduction which has already been repaid in full to the participants”. A government spokesperson said that “The rules are very clear and have been put in place to protect workers. The money that workers receive in their pay packets must be at least the national minimum wage with no exceptions. “Where employers want to offer benefits to workers – including with Christmas savings schemes – they can easily establish a scheme in line with the law by getting workers to pay into that scheme after they’ve been paid rather than deducting the money beforehand. “By consistently applying the law, we remove any possibility of a minority of bad employers using salary deductions to pay their staff less than the minimum wage.” ● ● Minimum wage factsheet – The Low Incomes Tax Reform Group (LITRG) has published a factsheet offering information and guidance on a number of areas to help care workers understand their minimum wage, tax and tax credit positions (https://bit.ly/2LwtGCs). And briefly… ● ● P45(Online) specification – HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) has published the design specification for form P45(Online) for software developers, covering the preparation and use of black-and-white Parts 1A, 2 and 3 which can be printed on plain white A4 paper once the final full payment submission has been successfully completed online (https://bit. ly/2ScHmJr). ● ● Deferment of class 1 NICs – A new version of form CA72A (and accompanying notes) to be used by an individual applying to defer payment of primary class 1 National Insurance contributions (NICs) in an employment for tax year 2019–20 can be found here: https://bit. ly/1QW9d61. ● Format for NICs calculations – The 2019–20 version of the National Insurance Contributions guidance for software developers , which sets out the calculation format for NICs and augments information in employer guidance, can be found here: https://bit. ly/2WFeNCN. ● ● Specification for PAYE tax tables routines – Version 17.1 of the specification, which covers the parameters for Welsh, Scottish and English and Northern Ireland tax routines for 2019–20 has been published (https://bit.ly/2MNM36i).
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KEEPING THE UK PAID
Diary dates
5 March 6 March
Last day of tax month 11 First day of tax month 12
Request your pack at nationalpayrollweek.co.uk or email npw@cipp.org.uk for more information.
Last day for submitting a real time information employer payment summary to apply to tax month 11 Deadline for payment of PAYE and NICs etc to HMRC’s Accounts Office by non-electronic method Deadline for payment of PAYE and NICs etc to HMRC’s Accounts Office by electronic method
19 March
22 March
5 April
Last day of tax month 12 and tax year 2018–19
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| Professional in Payroll, Pensions and Reward |
Issue 48 | March 2019
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