SSP & working a month in hand help please

Elgrouse

Hello,
Hoping someone can shed some light on this.

I work for the NHS & moved to a different department on a new contract on 07/02/20. My new contract is a ‘bank’ contract so I can work varying hours each week, however would usually work 3 full days.

I was paid £517 in March for the hours I’d worked in February. I was paid £404 in April for the hours I worked in March.

My last working day in March was 18/03 and I then came down with COVID symptoms on 21/03 and therefore had to go off sick. 

My employer has said I don’t qualify for SSP as my weekly earnings are too low. Assuming therefore they’re not looking at the hours I’ve worked, but the fact that I hadn’t actually been paid anything before going off sick.

Are they correct to do this? I can’t find anything definitive online. 

Savvy_Sue

Did they give you the form which tells you WHY they're not paying SSP, and what you can apply for instead? 

You do have to have earned an average of £120 pw so I'd say it was borderline for that reason. Take a look at https://www.gov.uk/employers-sick-pay/eligibility-and-form-ssp1 and the links before and after to see if that starts to make sense. 

chrisbur

I have no knowledge of the conditions that apply to "bank" workers though can confirm that had you gone off sick after the salary for March had been paid (assuming this was for a full month) then you would not have qualified for SSP ( unless the recent changes to the rules for COVID have changed things)   
As advised have you had an SSP1 form and do you not get company sick pay.  Have a look here
https://www.nhsemployers.org/covid19/staff-terms-and-conditions/staff-terms-and-conditions-faqs/pay
Item 9 of the sickness pay section.
EDIT
Added  (assuming this was for a full month)

Elgrouse

Thanks both.

i requested an SSP1 form today so I can escalate it with the HMRC SSP disputes team. If they’re right not to pay me then I’ll move on but to be honest i don’t think they’re entirely sure themselves. I was told I was going to be paid, but then nothing appeared in my account on pay day! Quite a stressful time.

Thank you for the NHS employers link, I have forwarded that on to payroll for them to read. If I’m reading it correctly it seems to indicate I should be paid full pay.

I’m frontline staff and unfortunately it was probably due to my job that I was ill in the first place, makes the lack of sick pay a little harder to swallow!