Some guidance has been put into place by the Government with regards to Furloughed workers and how the scheme will operate but it will take some time for the finer details to be agreed.
At the moment, we know the following details:
• The scheme is available to all UK businesses
• You will need to designate affected employees as ‘Furloughed workers’ and notify your employees of this change
• You will need to submit these employee details to HMRC via a new online portal (details on how to do this are yet to be released)
• HMRC will reimburse employers 80% of furloughed workers wage costs up to a cap of £2,500 per month. There is currently no system in place to make these reimbursements but HMRC have said that they are looking at this as a matter of urgency
• Furloughed workers cannot undertake any work for you during the time they are classed as Furloughed workers
• An individual cannot trigger becoming a Furloughed worker, this has to be determined by the employer
• The employer can top up the employee’s wage with the 20% balance, but they are not obliged to
• The Chancellor has announced it will be backdated to 1 March and is currently scheduled to run for at least 3 months, but this will be extended if required
• A new IT system needs to be put into place to run the scheme, but the Chancellor has said this will run into April before it is completed
