Archive for February, 2011

The following is an extract from the latest weekly informal update (dated 4 February) from HMRC to employer representatives. As you know, HMRC is committed to moving more of its business online and to significantly reduce the cost of the services it currently provides. As part of this commitment, we will no longer issue paper [...]

The Government is required by law to review actuarially the National Insurance contracting-out rebates for defined benefit and defined contribution pension schemes every five years.  The rates that will apply from April 2012, subject to confirmation, have been announced in a draft Statutory Instrument. The contracting-out rebates for defined benefit schemes apply to contracted-out salary [...]

HMRC has announced that the official rate of interest, which has been fixed at 4.00% for the whole of 2010/11 will be kept at that level into 2011/12.  There is no change to the other official rates that apply to loans made in Japanese yen or Swiss francs (3.9% and 5.5% respectively).  The official interest [...]

On 3 February, the Isle of Man signed a new double taxation agreement with Bahrain.  The agreement will enter into force following confirmation by both parties that their necessary legal procedures have been completed.  The provisions of the agreement will then have effect from 1 January of the following year. Further information: Isle Of Man [...]

Under new minimum wage amendment Regulations, with effect from 1 April 2011, all payments made by employers to employees that represent amounts paid by customers by way of a service charge, tip, gratuity or cover charge do not count towards the minimum wage, whether or not they are paid through the payroll. the limit on [...]

Each week we receive a number of payroll questions on our forum, and here are this week’s batch. Can you help with any answers? Forum posts: Deduction for sick pay I recently had to have a day off sick as my daughter was unwell and unable to attend school. When I received my payslip it [...]

Last month we urged you to audit your discipline procedures. Well, while you are in the mood, do the same with your equal opportunities policies, procedures and practices since failure in this area again leads to many legal actions and some hefty awards of compensation against employers. And often this is not a result of [...]

Rule books can so easily become out of date. The work environment changes, standards change, and perhaps nobody has ever really noticed that many of the rules are now redundant or inappropriate. There have been cases where employees have had disciplinary sanctions overturned because the rule book did not make clear that what they had [...]

We at the Learn Centre are nothing if not positive. We are therefore quite concerned to hear the distress suffered by some of our clients who seem to believe that the, admittedly inevitable, recession will bring an end to their world. A common question that we are asked is “How can we motivate our employees [...]

Here we take our weekly look at answering some of the tricky HR questions we’ve been emailed. If you have a tricky HR question you needs answering email it to help@payroll-help.com and we’ll post the best here with an answer each week. Disciplining Different Types of Misconduct One of our employees has appealed to me against [...]

Last month’s nice little problem was this: Last month you were left with the following simple question: If you overtake the third person in a race, what position are you now in? I’m sure you had no trouble with this one though some of your colleagues may have answered too hastily and said “second”. The [...]

Two consultation documents are featured this week – although one is called a “discussion document” and the other a “call for evidence”.  HMRC’s document looks at what could be done to simplify the many remaining penalty regimes, and the DWP’s document explores “regulatory arbitrage” in the context of automatic enrolment.  Regulatory what? Our Employer FAQ [...]

Since 2007, HMRC has introduced new penalty structures for common offences across the different tax and duty regimes.  Those that impact on the taxes involved in payroll are: penalties for inaccuracies in returns penalties for late filing penalties for late payment. There are however, countless (actually over 300) other “regulatory” penalties that apply to specific [...]

The review Making automatic enrolment work, commissioned by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) and published in October 2010, warned that some regulatory differences between occupational and personal pensions could create “regulatory arbitrage”.  The review team recommended that “Government should review as a matter of urgency the scope for regulatory arbitrage between the trust [...]

The Seafarers’ Earnings Deduction (section 40 of the Income Tax (Earnings and Pensions) Act 2003) can provide 100% UK tax relief on earnings from carrying out duties as a seafarer wholly or partly outside the UK, during an eligible period.  One of the qualifying conditions for the deduction is that the claimant must be ordinarily [...]

On 12 August, the First-Tier Tax Tribunal allowed the employer’s appeal against an HMRC decision that lump sum payments paid for motoring expenses were part of the salaries of the employees concerned and therefore subject to Class 1 NICs.  The employer, Total People, argued that the lump sums were mileage allowance payments and therefore exempt [...]

Following a meeting on 14 January 2011, the Agricultural Wages Board for Northern Ireland proposes to increase existing minimum rates for agricultural workers across all grades by 1.9% from 4 April 2011. The proposed new rates are: Minimum Rate, applicable for the first 40 weeks cumulative employment – £6.04 per hour. Grade 2 – Standard [...]

New hourly rates of pay for construction craftsmen, operative and apprentices came into force on 4 February 2011 under the provisions of the Registered Employment Agreement for the Construction Industry. The new rates are a 7.5% reduction on the rates that have been in force since January 2008. Further information: Registered Employment Agreement – Construction [...]

The Universal Social Charge (USC) was introduced from 1 January, although the Finance Act 2011, which provides the statutory basis for the new charge, was not enacted until 31 January. All individuals are liable to pay the USC if their gross income exceeds the threshold of €4,004 p.a. (€77 per week). On 25 January, the [...]

Each week we receive a number of payroll questions on our forum, and here are this week’s batch. Can you help with any answers? Forum posts: Lieu of notice payment One of our employees has just been made redundant and is to receive a redundancy payment above the basic legal requirement and to be given [...]