Can we furlough someone on ssp

Jeremy535897

I suggest then that you furlough her on 80% of her wage, but you will need her to agree to be furloughed and agree to the change in contract:

"Agreeing to furlough employees

Employers should discuss with their staff and make any changes to the employment contract by agreement. When employers are making decisions in relation to the process, including deciding who to offer furlough to, equality and discrimination laws will apply in the usual way.

To be eligible for the grant employers must confirm in writing to their employee confirming that they have been furloughed. A record of this communication must be kept for five years.

You do not need to place all your employees on furlough. However, those employees who you do place on furlough cannot undertake work for you."

calcotti

Jeremy535897 said:

Referring to calcotti's post, I am struggling to understand quite what the Treasury Direction is saying, but I think the paragraph he quotes says that the 3 week minimum furlough period does not begin until after the SSP ends. It doesn't actually say you can't furlough them. Otherwise it would just say that a person on SSP cannot be furloughed. SSP can run for 28 weeks. If you amend her contract to pay her only 80% of her wages, and furlough her, and she agrees to both, how much more would you be paying her on furlough than under SSP? That is the risk if your furlough claim is denied. 

I was reading the Direction again after I posted and I agree with this. It think it means that the period of SSP eligibility doesn't count towards the 21 day minimum period of furlough. However this puts the employer in a tough position. Employee entitled to SSP, employer puts them on furlough, unless the employee then remains on furlough for at least 21 days after the SSP entitlement ends they will not be counted as eligible to be claimed for against the CJRS. If they become ill after being furloughed the resulting SSP eligibility is ignored.

In the case of someone who is shielding, whilst general guidance says they can be followed, I can't see how, now that they are entitled to SSP, they can ever be eligible for CJRS unless they were furloughed before getting the shielding letter.

You and I have both expressed frustration previously that we have all been working off guidance and needing regulations to refer to. Unfortunately the Treasury Direction (which is effectively the regulation/rules) seems to have confused things further - and is incredibly hard to understand.

Jeremy535897

You might also be interested in paragraph 8.6 and 8.7:
"8.6 No claim under CJRS may include amounts of specified benefits payable or liable to be payable in respect of an employee (whether or not a claim to the relevant specified benefit is actually made) during the employee’s period of furlough and the gross amount of earnings falling for reimbursement as described in paragraph 8.2 must be correspondingly reduced.
8.7 The specified benefits for the purposes of paragraph 8.6 are-
 (a) Statutory Sick Pay pursuant to section 151 of SSCBA or section 147 of SSCB(NI)A;
 (b) Statutory Maternity Pay pursuant to section 164 of SSCBA or section 160 of SSCB(NI)A;
 (c) Statutory Adoption Pay pursuant to section 171ZL of SSCBA or section 167ZL of SSCB(NI)A;
 (d) Statutory Paternity Pay pursuant to sections 171ZA and 171ZB of SSCBA or sections 167ZA and 167ZB of SSCB(NI)A;
 (e) Statutory Shared Parental Pay pursuant to sections 171ZU and 171ZV of SSCBA or sections 167ZU and 167 ZW of SSCB(NI)A;
 (f) Statutory Parental Bereavement Pay pursuant to section 171ZZ6 of SSCBA or any provision made for Northern Ireland which corresponds to that section."

Jeremy535897

And if you really want to dwell on SSP etc you can work through 7.10 to 7.15, which seem to be a very complicated way of saying that you don't take note of SSP in certain circumstances in computing fixed rate employees' reference pay.
What worries me in 8.2 is that it covers not only SSP, but where you could have claimed SSP but didn't. I must be missing something that says furlough trumps SSP, but I'm not seeing it.

Mrsleonard

It's so confussing. From the latest government update on the page it seems that 'Long term sick' can be furloughed. Long term sick is 4 weeks +. The latest sick note can be replaced by furloughed pay. BUT ONLY IF SHE AGREES !!! Which could be a sticking point.

calcotti

Treasury Direction has defeated me.

Jeremy535897

Mrsleonard said:

It's so confussing. From the latest government update on the page it seems that 'Long term sick' can be furloughed. Long term sick is 4 weeks +. The latest sick note can be replaced by furloughed pay. BUT ONLY IF SHE AGREES !!! Which could be a sticking point.

Is she entitled to redundancy pay if you make her redundant? How long has she worked for you?

Mrsleonard

Jeremy535897
Yes she's worked for us almost 6 years! Before Corona virus hit we would have looked at dismissing her for incompetence. However she went off sick before we could do anything. We are not in a position financially to make her redundant unfortunately.

Jeremy535897

You will have to see if she will accept being furloughed, unfortunately.