The UK Government’s Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme is currently tapering down and will close on 31 October 2020. Since the beginning of August, employers have had to pay for their own pension contributions and National Insurance contributions for all staff.  

Employers will still be able to claim 70% of staff wages through the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme in September, and 60% in October, before the scheme closes on the 31st.  

Even if you are making a claim under the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme, your normal payroll process still runs as usual despite the changes to the scheme in September and October. If you have reduced your furloughed staff’s pay from their regular salary amount, you will need to continue to run your payroll as normal on this amount of pay. If you have chosen to top up your furloughed staff’s pay, you will need to continue to run payroll as normal using this amount of pay.  

When paying your furloughed staff, deductions such as tax and national insurance contributions as well as pension contributions must continue to be made from your furloughed member of staff’s pay and paid as usual.  

Despite changes to the scheme you, and your furloughed staff’s, pension obligations remain unchanged. You still need to upload the contribution schedules to your pension provider and pay the staff and employer pension contributions over to the pension scheme calculated on the furlough pay. 

With less than two months left until the government’s Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme closes at the end of October, it’s important to keep on top of your automatic enrolment requirements as the scheme changes.  

More detail and advice can be found on the Pension Regulator’s employer guidance. 

The OptEnrol team are here to help with ensuring your contributions are correctly calculated during this period – if we can be of any help please do not hesitate to get in touch.