smp verses maternity allowance

asturdy2

Stay with me this is abit complicated ! My partner earns £87 per week which means she doesn't qualify for SMP. The limit is £97 for SMP but you work this out during an 8 week test period. My partner does work some extra hours occaisionly which would push her over the £97 threshold.Maternity allowance is £124 per week as is smp or 90% of your gross wage whichever is lower.

So my qustion is:- if my partner earnes an average of £98 during the test period and thus qualified for SMP, does this mean she would get 90% of £98 ? If yes this means she would be better off not doing the extra hours and qualfiying for MA at £124 per week. If this is the case then it shows it pays NOT to work.

cazj80

Hi,

I am on Maternity Allowance at the moment, and the weekly rate is £124.88 or 90% of your wages, whichever is lower, it is not automatically the higher amount unfortunately. I found the main difference with SMP and MA is that on SMP you get the 90% of your wages for 6 weeks, which you don't get on MA, oh and MA is not counted towards tax credits as income, whereas with SMP they take £100 off per week for income calculations.

Hope this helps.

asturdy2

so she is better off not doing extra hours and getting maternity allowance ? this seems stupid. the lel is set too low at 97 it should be 140 then 90% would be the same as smp.

cazj80

asturdy2 wrote: »

so she is better off not doing extra hours and getting maternity allowance ? this seems stupid. the lel is set too low at 97 it should be 140 then 90% would be the same as smp.

I didn't qualify for SMP because I fell pregnant in the week before I started at my new job, so I knew I would have to go for Maternity Allowance, there was no other choice!

Both SMP and MA are £124.88 per week, or 90% of your wages if this is lower, so if she earns £98 and claims MA she should get £88.20. She would also get this on SMP if she earnt £98 per week.

On SMP you get 6 weeks at 90% of your wages. So if for example you earnt £200 per week, and were on SMP, for the first 6 weeks you would get £180 (which is 90% of wages) then £124.88 for the remaining 33 weeks, if the full 39 weeks were taken.

On MA you would only get £124.88 for the same 39 weeks.

However, the way I understand it, ou get more benefit from SMP, if you can qualify if as you say you earn over £140 a week.

I hope this makes sense.

Duncombe

MA is not automatically paid at £124.88 a week (unless you are self employed and have been paying Class2 National Insurance Conts). Both SMP and MA are worked out on an average of your earnings.

The above poster has explained very clearly what she would get from MA and SMP if she earns £98 a week.