April claims

Employers can now submit CJRS claims for periods in April. These must be made by Friday 14 May.

You can claim before, during or after you process your payroll. If you can, it’s best to make a claim once you are sure of the exact number of hours your employees will work so you do not have to amend your claim later.

If you haven’t submitted your claim for March, but believe that you have a reasonable excuse for missing the 14 April deadline, check if you can make a late claim by searching ‘claim for wages’ on GOV.UK. Remember to keep records that support the amount of CJRS grants you claim, in case HMRC needs to check them.

You must pay the associated employee tax and National Insurance contributions to HMRC. If you do not do that, you will need to repay the whole of the CJRS grant to HMRC.

The UK Government will continue to pay 80% of your furloughed employees’ usual wages for the hours not worked, up to a cap of £2,500 per month, to the end of June.

In July, CJRS grants will cover 70% of employees’ usual wages for the hours not worked, up to a cap of £2,187.50. In August and September, this will then reduce to 60% of employees’ usual wages, up to a cap of £1,875.

You will need to pay the difference from July, so that you continue to pay your furloughed employees at least 80% of their usual wages for the hours they do not work during this time, up to a cap of £2,500 per month.

CJRS eligibility from May

If you have employees who have previously been ineligible for the CJRS, as they were not on your payroll on 30 October 2020, they may be eligible for periods from 1 May 2021 onwards.

From May you will be able to claim for eligible employees who were on your PAYE payroll on 2 March 2021. This means you must have made a PAYE Real Time Information (RTI) submission between 20 March 2020 and 2 March 2021, notifying HMRC of earnings for that employee.

You and your employees do not need to have benefitted from the scheme before to make a claim, as long as you meet the eligibility criteria. For more information on eligibility, search ‘check if you can claim for your employees’ wages’ on GOV.UK.

Please contact us for help in submitting your claims, we will continue to support our clients in processing claims until the end of the scheme.