Last Friday, HM Government announced the outline of how the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (“CJRS”) will develop following the initial 4-month period.

The scheme will become more flexible from 1 July, allowing businesses to bring back employees on a part-time basis, while receiving CJRS grant support for the employees’ normal days not worked.

There will then be a phased reduction of Government support. From August onwards, the employer will be required to fund the employer’s national insurance contributions and auto-enrolment pension contributions. From September, the Government grant will only cover 70% of the employee’s wage and the employer will be required to contribute 10% to bring this up to 80%. In October, the grant will reduce to 60%, with the employer required to contribute 20%.

It is important to note that the scheme will close to new entrants from 30 June.

Only employees who have been furloughed for a full 3 week period prior to 30 June will be eligible to be included in the “extended” scheme. This means that the final date an employer can furlough an employee is 10 June 2020.

Where employers have furloughed only part of their workforce, it would be advisable (where possible) to rotate the furloughed employees by 10 June. This will ensure all relevant employees have been furloughed for at least 3 weeks, and can then be furloughed and included in a claim under the flexible/extended scheme if necessary. It is understood that the maximum number of employees that will be able to be included on a claim after 1 July is the maximum number included on a claim in the first period of the scheme.

Please visit our COVID-19 resource page to see more information on the CJRS and other Government support schemes. We will post updates as we become aware of new information – further guidance on how the CJRS claim will be calculated from 1 July is due to be issued by HMRC on 12 June 2020.