Treasury Direction updated
28 January 2021
On 25 January 2021, the Chancellor, Rishi Sunak made a Treasury Direction under Section 71 and 76 of the Coronavirus Act, which extended the effect of the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (CJRS).
The Direction asserts that HMRC is responsible for both the payment and the managements of amounts paid under the CJRS. The schedule to this direction sets out the scheme that will apply for the period commencing on 1 February 2021, and ending on 30 April 2021, when it is intended that the scheme will close.
In recognition of the fact that there is an overlap, because CJRS was originally implemented in March 2020, the Direction amends the rules that govern how to calculate both reference salary and usual hours for certain claim periods. Upon calculation of furlough claims relating to both March and April 2021, when establishing claim amounts for those who are variably paid, then the earnings of March and April 2019 will be used to calculate the figure, or the pay over the past 12 months, whichever is higher. This has also been confirmed in associated guidance on the topic from HMRC.
This is only applicable to those individuals that are variably paid, who were eligible for the first set of grants, and so were on payroll, and a Real Time Information (RTI) submission sent relating to them, on or prior to 19 March 2020.
The information in this article is accurate at the time of publication. For all the latest information, news and resources on how the COVID-19 pandemic is affecting payroll professions, visit our Coronavirus hub.