Maternity - protecting myself

Ink_Ognito

Hi folks,
Sorry if this has been covered. Forum search doesn't work on my phone.

ACAS site says:

'Statutory maternity pay (SMP) will be payable if the expectant mother has been employed continuously for at least 26 weeks ending with the 15th week before the expected week of childbirth...'

The cynic in me says - what's stopping them making me redundant 16 weeks before I have baby? Should I hold back the news til 15w to go?

I have a reasonable relationship with my boss, but my company has been through the wringer in the last few years and I don't trust it not to behave badly in any given situation. My colleague was put on notice of redundancy when she was 2 weeks away from
birth! It worked out ok in the end and at least she would have got maternity pay as well as redundancy... but still!

Thanks for reading

marybelle01

It's swings and roundabouts. They could guess (not actually that hard!) and then make you redundant and then claim that since they didn't know you were pregnant then they couldn't have done it because you were pregnant! If you don't trust them to act well in any given situation then you just have to accept that any given situation could be the wrong one! So you make the choice you think is best for you.

Ink_Ognito

It's not the redundancy as such that bothers me - more that it seems to me they could get out of paying me maternity pay, knowing I'm pregnant, as long as they don't serve me my notice in the last 15w. Either my understanding is flawed, or there's a bit of a hole in the system.

ktothema

There's nothing stopping the making you redundant either way sadly. However if you don't qualify for SMP because you haven't worked the 26 weeks up to week 15 prior, it's still likely you could qualify for maternity allowance. And MA isnt a taxable benefit where SMP is.

If you're really worried check MA out. Assuming you have the correct amount of NI contributions it's the same amount for the same time.

Ink_Ognito

Thanks kto, didn't know about MA... But

'Maternity Allowance pays a standard weekly rate of £135.45 or 90 per cent of your average gross weekly earnings (before tax), whichever is the smaller.'

Ouch

Edit: sorry to be clearer, SMA at 90% of my weekly salary would work out a fair bit more.

ktothema

The only difference between SMP and MA is this:
for the first six weeks at 90 per cent of your average gross weekly earnings with no upper limit
Yes, this could be quite a difference but you'd also lose through tax and NI on this.

Unless what you're worried about is actually losing additional company maternity pay.

Ink_Ognito

Thanks - my company gives nothing beyond what it has to. But after tax etc, my weekly earnings are three times more than MA... I can't see how that difference could be made up?

ktothema

Sadly if your company make your role redundant before the 15 weeks MA is your only option. After the 15 weeks your company would still be responsible for SMP. After you leave for maternity there are other rules re redundancy.

SMP is paid by the government (your company reclaim it) so it would be odd for them to make you redundant to escape that.