From 24 March, individuals with COVID will no longer be eligible for SSP from day one of their illness and will only receive the payment on their fourth consecutive day off work – in line with the normal SSP rules.
With all the attention focused on the remaining restrictions easing, employers may easily miss a raft of employment law developments that come into effect in April 2022. We outline some of the key changes to employment law occurring over the next month, which employers should be aware of.
Important Dates:
• 15 March 2022 – Laws requiring mandatory vaccination in care homes and for health and social care workers will be revoked.• 17 March 2022 – The SSP rebate scheme for Covid-related sickness closes.
• 24 March 2022 – The COVID-19 provisions within the Statutory Sick Pay and Employment and Support Allowance regulations will be removed.
• 1 April 2022 – National minimum wage rates will increase.
• 3 April 2022 – Family friendly payment rates will increase.
• 6 April 2022 – The ability to manually check the status of those with a biometric residence card or permit, or frontier work permit, will be removed. From that date, only online checks will be possible. The employer will need the individual’s date of birth and right to work share code to complete these checks.
• 6 April 2022 – The following rates will increase: SSP rate, Compensation limits, statutory guarantee pay and weekly redundancy payments. National insurance contributions will also increase by 1.25%.
• 6 April 2022- HMRC has requested that payslips include a message to say “1.25% uplift in NICs funds NHS, health & social care.” This is in place until 5 April 2023.
• 6 April 2022 – The lower earnings limit will increase for the first time in two years, to £123.
