Furlough was introduced at the beginning of lockdown. The aim of the furlough scheme is to allow companies to continue employing workers, even when lockdown means there’s nothing for them to do. The government pays up to 80% of an employee’s salary (up to a maximum of £2,500 per month).
Furlough investigations are ramping up. At the end of January HMRC released a list of over 750,000 employers that have claimed the furlough grant in what it said was part of its “commitment to transparency and to deter fraudulent claims”. HMRC will also be publishing more details such as the company number and how much has been claimed.
We have had our first client contacted for a random “compliance check”. We were able to provide them with all the information they needed to support their furlough investigation.
Here is the information requested:
- Employee personal details – name, address, National Insurance Number
- Furlough letter – including start and end dates
- Details of how you calculate their ‘usual’ pay
- How you collected their furlough pay
- The amount of furlough pay claimed
- Evidence that they were paid at least the amount claimed (eg BACs list or payslip)
- Employer National Insurance contribution claimed
- Employer pension contribution claimed
- The amount paid in pension contribution including evidence
- Evidence that they were included in the RTI submission either before 20 March 2020 or 30 October 2020 depending when you started the furlough claims
- Details of any corrections or adjustments
HMRC will “not set out to try to find employers that have made legitimate mistakes” when claiming through the job retention scheme. If you find you have made a mistake in your claim and need to repay some or all of your CJRS claim please report this to HMRC as soon as possible. They will work with you to arrange repayment.
As always, if there is anything you would like to discuss give us a call or drop us an e-mail. We’d love to grab a coffee and chat over zoom!