The draft The National Minimum Wage (Amendment) Regs 2017 have been published, with the increases intended to come into force on 1 April 2017.
The following wage rate changes are expected:
National Living Wage rate:
- for workers aged 25 or above, rises to £7.50 p.h. (30p increase)
National Minimum Wage rates:
- Adult Rate: workers aged under 25 but at least 21 rises to £7.05 p.h. (10p increase)
- Development Rate: workers aged at least 18 but under 21 rises to £5.60 p.h. (5p increase);
- Young Workers rate: workers aged under 18 who are no longer of compulsory school age rises to £4.05 p.h. (5p increase); and
- Apprentice rate: increases to £3.50 p.h. (10p increase)
Note: From this date forward, any changes to the National Minimum Wage and National Living Wage will take place at the same time - in April each year, so need to worry about any changes in October from now on.
Comment: Nearer the time, if you have employees affected by the rates increase you should notify them in writing and put a copy of the letter on their personnel file. Do you need a letter to help you? Just get in touch.
We have produced a handy pocket-sized Employment Fact Card that contains all the latest statutory rates an employer should know — if you'd like a copy (or want more copies if you already have one) then please send your request via info@thepersonneldept.co.uk
Oh, BTW, if you’ve already seen the list of the worst excuses that employers have made for not paying minimum wage, then you’d be forgiven for thinking that surely, these aren’t things that real employers have said. No one could possibly be that shortsighted, or irresponsible could they?!
But the fact of the matter is that these are real excuses, collected by government-funded research, that bosses gave for breaking the law by paying their staff below the legislated amount.
If you haven’t heard about them ye, here they are:
1. “She doesn’t deserve the national minimum wage because she only makes the teas and sweeps the floors.”
2. “The national minimum wage doesn’t apply to my business.”
3. “My employee is still learning so they aren’t entitled to the national minimum wage.”
4. “My accountant and I speak a different language – he doesn’t understand me and that’s why he doesn’t pay my workers the correct wages.”
5. “I thought it was okay to pay foreign workers below the national minimum wage as they aren’t British and therefore don’t have the right to be paid it.”
6. “It’s part of UK culture not to pay young workers for the first three months as they have to prove their ‘worth’ first.”
7. “The employee wasn’t a good worker so I didn’t think they deserved to be paid the national minimum wage.”
8. “I’ve got an agreement with my workers that I won’t pay them the national minimum wage; they understand and they even signed a contract to this effect.”
9. “My workers like to think of themselves as being self employed and the national minimum wage doesn’t apply to people who work for themselves.”
10. “My workers are often just on standby when there are no customers in the shop; I only pay them for when they’re actually serving someone.”
Unbelievable hey!
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