How to claim on the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme

Posted: 21 / 01 / 2021

Under the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (CJRS), the Government announced that employers will be able to claim a grant from 1 March to cover 80 per cent of employees’ salaries up to a maximum of £2,500 per month.

In this previous post we covered exactly what the Scheme is and who is eligible. Below are details on:

• What records you need to keep to claim
• How to claim?
• Amending a claim

What records should you keep?

HMRC have confirmed that employers need to keep the following records for 6 years;

• the amount claimed and claim period for each employee
• the claim reference number for your records
• your calculations in case HMRC need more information about your claim
• usual hours worked, including any calculations that were required, for employees you flexibly furloughed
• actual hours worked for employees you flexibly furloughed

How to claim?

Employers can claim via HMRC’s online portal. To access the portal, employers will need their Government Gateway ID and password when they registered for PAYE online.

Employers can claim before or after they process their payroll as long as the claim is submitted by the relevant claim deadline.

If you miss these deadlines, HMRC may still accept late claims if you have a reasonable excuse, have taken reasonable care to try and claim on time and have claimed without delay as soon as you were able to. HMRC have listed the following as examples of a reasonable excuse:

• your partner or another close relative died shortly before the claim deadline
• you had an unexpected stay in hospital that prevented you from dealing with your claim
• you had a serious or life-threatening illness, including Coronavirus related illnesses, which prevented you from making your claim (and no one else could claim for you)
• a period of self-isolation prevented you from making your claim (and no one else could make the claim for you)
• your computer or software failed just before or while you were preparing your online claim
• service issues with HMRC online services prevented you from making your claim
• a fire, flood or theft prevented you them from making your claim
• postal delays that you could not have predicted prevented you from making your claim
• delays related to a disability you have prevented you from making your claim
• an HMRC error prevented you from making your claim

Can you amend a claim?

HMRC have confirmed that employers can amend a claim for periods after 1 November 2020, but there is a deadline to do this;

What happens when the Scheme ends?

Employers will need to decide whether to bring employees back to work, reduce their hours or make them redundant.

Ask us about paying your employees ➞