Coronavirus Employees' Help

• The furlough scheme will run until 30 September 2021. The scheme's duration had been extended a number of times, but furlough will finally come to a close at the end of this month.
  
  
• Employees on furlough continue to get 80% of their salary for hours not worked, up to £2,500/month. This will remain the case until the scheme ends. 
  
  
• Until July an employee's furloughed wage was covered entirely by the state. Employers only needed to cover any pension and National Insurance costs.
  

• Since August employers have needed to contribute more to the scheme. Since 1 August, the state will only cover 60% of an employee's wage for hours not worked, capped at £1,875/month, with employers required to top this up to 80%, capped at £2,500/month. Employers also continue to cover any pension and National Insurance costs.

• Employers across the UK can use the scheme – even if they haven't before. So those in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland should also be able to apply. It's open to small, medium and large employers, and those which are charitable or not-for-profit – and crucially your employer doesn't previously need to have used the furlough scheme.
  
  
• You DON'T need to have been furloughed before to take part. However, depending on what period you're claiming for you need to have been on your employer's payroll at a certain date to take part:
  
  - For any furlough claims up until 30 April you need to have been on your employer's PAYE payroll on or before 30 October 2020 to be eligible. To be precise, your employer must have made a Real Time Information payroll submission on your behalf on or before 30 October 2020.
  
  - For any furlough claims from 1 May until the end of September you need to have been on your employer's PAYE payroll on 2 March 2021 to be eligible. To be precise, your employer must have made a Real Time Information payroll submission on your behalf on or before 2 March 2021.
  
  
• You WILL be able to work part-time while on furlough. Your employer can either put you on furlough full-time, or you'll be able to work part-time and be furloughed for the hours you don't work. Your employer will have to cover your wages at the normal rate for any hours you do work. For more information, see below.

• You can't work for your employer during the hours you're furloughed. This includes your normal work obligations and anything beyond your usual remit. However, you can work for another employer while furloughed (if your contract allows this) or volunteer elsewhere.

• Employees on all types of contract can take part. This includes those on zero-hours contracts and fixed-term contracts, as well as agency workers (including those employed by umbrella companies) and supply teachers. This was confirmed by the Treasury in guidance it published on 10 November 2020.

• Those who are 'clinically extremely vulnerable' to coronavirus can continue to be furloughed. As of April, people who have been classified as 'clinically extremely vulnerable' are no longer being advised to shield, and to not travel into the workplace. However, your employer can still furlough you if you remain unwilling to travel into the workplace but you're unable to work from home, even though the official shielding advice now ended. This is at the employer's discretion though. 

Rehired and furloughed in March or April? Your eligibility for furlough might've changed since May

For furlough claims relating to the period 1 May and onwards, employees need to have been on their employer's payroll on 2 March 2021 to be eligible.

This presents an issue if you were rehired by your old employer in March or April 2021. That's because while you might've been successfully furloughed at the time of your rehiring (for any furlough claims up until 30 April, employees had to have been on their employer's payroll on or before 30 October 2020), you might find that you're suddenly ineligible for furlough from 1 May – as for any claims relating to the period 1 May and onwards employees need to have been on their employer's payroll on 2 March 2021.

Currently furloughed? You can work part-time

Your employer can have you work for it on a part-time basis, while furloughing you for the remaining hours or weeks. Your employer will have to pay your wage for any hours that you are in work.

Here's how being on furlough for some hours but working your other hours happens in practice...

• There's no limit on the number of hours you can work. For example, if you work a 40-hour week and your employer wants to, it can get you to work 39 hours and then furlough you for the remaining hour. The amount of time you work each week can also vary over the month, with employers varying it week by week.
  
  
• When you are working, you should be paid your normal wage for those hours. For the hours you're not working, you'll be covered by furlough pay, so you'll get at least 80% of your normal wage. Let's run through an example of how work and furlough pay could interact:
  
  Let's assume you work a 40-hour week, and you earn £1,000 a month for that. On furlough, you don't work and you get £800 a month.
  
  Yet if you went back to work for 10 hours a week, that's a quarter of your normal working time, so you'd earn £250 a month for the work you do. Yet you're still furloughed for 30 hours a week, so you get three quarters of your monthly furlough pay – that's £600.
  
  Adding it up, you'd get a total of £850 a month working those 10 hours, compared with £800 on full furlough.

Can I work one hour on and one hour off?

Of course, for some customer-facing workers who are paid per client, such as hairdressers, the workplace restrictions imposed because of coronavirus might mean reduced customer footfall when you actually restart work.

This will likely make the transition back to work financially challenging for many of these workers, as for the hours you're physically at work you won't be able to claim furlough pay – you can't, for instance, claim furlough pay for three hours of work that you've 'lost' through being at work but having to make the workplace Covid-safe, rather than seeing clients.

Self-isolating ahead of surgery? You could also qualify for SSP. If you're told to self-isolate by a healthcare professional ahead of surgery, then you might also be eligible for SSP. It's payable from day one, but you'll need to self-isolate for at least four days prior to surgery to qualify (or three days, with surgery taking place on the fourth). The other SSP eligibility rules will also apply (ie, employed and earning at least £120/week).