April 2020 Changes to Statutory Pay Rates and National Minimum Wage

April is traditionally the time of year when new statutory pay rates and employment laws come into force.

We’ve written blogs about some of the other changes that are coming into force from April including changes to written particulars of employment and the reintroduction of the naming and shaming regime for national minimum wage breaches.

Here we set out for you some of the most important changes that could impact on your organisation.

National Minimum Wage

1 April saw the national minimum wage hourly rates increase as follows:

• National Living Wage (those aged 25 and over) is now £8.72
• Standard adult rate (those aged 21 and 24 inclusive) has increased to £8.20
• Development rate (those aged 18- 20 inclusive) is now £6.45
• Young workers rate (those aged under 18 but above the compulsory school age and who are not apprentices) is £4.55
• Apprentice rate is £4.15 (for those apprentices less than 19 years old or those 19 years of age and older but in the first year of their apprenticeship)

Statutory Sick Pay

As of 6 April 2020 statutory sick pay will be £95.85 per week (up from £94.25 per week).

Family- related pay

The rates for statutory maternity, paternity, adoption and shared parental pay will increase from £148.68 per week to £151.20 per week with effect from 5 April 2020. For the first time statutory parental bereavement pay will be payable from April 2020 and will be at the same rate as other family- related pay, £151.20.

Statutory redundancy pay and awards for unfair dismissal

The statutory limit on a week’s pay for the purposes of calculating both statutory redundancy pay and unfair dismissal basic award will increase from 6 April 2020 to £538. This rate applies to dismissals where the employee’s effective date of termination is on or after 6 April 2020.

This means that the maximum basic award or statutory redundancy payment is now £16,140.

At the same time the statutory cap on the compensatory award element of a successful claim for unfair dismissal has now increased to £88,519. This means that the maximum amount a Claimant can be awarded for a compensatory award in such cases is now the lower of 52 weeks’ actual gross pay of the employee or £88,519.

Find out more on any of the above topics by contacting a member of our Employment and Pensions team.