As the government makes announcements months in advance it’s easy to forget the changes for your business faces.

So you can be forgiven for overlooking or even forgetting deadlines until just days before they are implemented.
For businesses, April 2022 will see a number of changes to payroll and you will need to budget for extra expenditure. They come at a difficult time as other costs are already rising.

As well as National Insurance contributions rising, there is an increase in the national minimum wage and statutory sick pay.

Here are the changes for your business in the 2022/2023 financial year.

National Insurance Contributions

NICs for both employers and employees will increase by 1.25% from April 6th. This is to fund additional health and social care services. A separate 1.25% health and social care levy will be collected from April 2023, when NICs will revert to the current rate.

National Minimum Wage

The government is increasing the National Minimum Wage rates from April 1st, 2022 as follows:

• The National Living Wage (applied to those 23 and over) increases to £9.50
• Minimum hourly rates increase as follows: 21-22 year olds to £9.18; 18-20 year olds to £6.83; 16-17 year olds to £4.81
• The apprentice rate also increases to £4.81
• The accommodation offset rates will increase with a daily rate of £8.70 and a weekly rate of £60.90

Statutory Sick Pay

Statutory Sick Pay (SSP) is another one of the changes for your business from April. This increases to £99.35 per week from April 6th. For the first time in two years, the minimum average weekly earnings required to qualify increases to £123 a week.

Family-related Pay

The rates for Statutory Maternity, Paternity, Adoption, Parental Bereavement and Shared Parental Pay increases to £156.66 a week from April 3rd. The employee is only entitled to the lesser of the 90% of their normal weekly earnings. However, the exception is Statutory Maternity Pay and Statutory Adoption pay, where 90% of normal weekly earnings is guaranteed for the first six weeks.

Like SSP, the minimum average weekly earnings required to qualify for these payments is £123.

For full details of the announcements, check out the government’s website.

As ever in business, changes regularly take place. If you run a business and want more help understanding your finances, contact our team for a no obligation chat.