The Job Retention Bonus (JRB) is a £1,000 one-off taxable payment to employers for each eligible employee that was furloughed and kept continuously employed until 31 January 2021.

Companies will be able to claim the JRB between 15 February 2021 and 31 March 2021. The money does not need to be paid to the employee.

Details on how to claim the JRB online will be published in January but details of who can claim, etc. are below.

Who can claim

You can claim if you’re an employer who has furloughed employees and made an eligible claim for them through the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme. You can still claim the bonus if you make a claim for that employee through the new Job Support Scheme that comes in to effect in November. Guidance on the Job Support Scheme will be published shortly.

Employees you can claim for

You can claim for employees that:

• you made an eligible claim for under the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme
• you kept continuously employed from the end of the claim period of your last Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme claim for them, until 31 January 2021
• are not serving a contractual or statutory notice period for you on 31 January 2021 (this includes people serving notice of retirement)

If HMRC are still checking your Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme claims, you can still claim the Job Retention Bonus but your payment may be delayed until those checks are completed.

HMRC will not pay the bonus if you made an incorrect Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme claim and your employee was not eligible for the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme.

If you are making redundancies

If you make redundancies, you must comply with the normal rules for redundancy, which include using fair redundancy criteria. These rules apply even if this means that fewer of your employees are eligible for the Job Retention Bonus.

Claiming for an individual who’s not an employee

You can claim the Job Retention Bonus for individuals who are not employees, such as office holders or agency workers, as long as you claimed a grant for them under the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme and the other Job Retention Bonus eligibility criteria are met.

Get ready to claim

Before you can claim the bonus, you will to need to have reported all payments made to your employee between 6 November 2020 and 5 February 2021 to HMRC through Full Payment Submissions via Real Time Information (RTI).

There are some steps you need to take now to make sure you’re ready to claim.

You must:

• still be enrolled for PAYE online
• comply with your PAYE obligations to file accurately and on time for all employees between 6 April 2020 and 5 February 2021
• keep your payroll up to date and make sure you report the leaving date for any employees that stop working for you before the end of the pay period that they leave in
• use the irregular payment pattern indicator in Real Time Information (RTI) for any employees not being paid regularly
• comply with all requests from HMRC to provide any employee data for past Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme claims

Using an agent to do PAYE online and claim the Job Retention Bonus

If you use an agent who is authorised to do PAYE online for you, they will be able to claim the Job Retention Bonus on your behalf.

Tax treatment of the Job Retention Bonus

You must include payments you receive under the scheme as income when you calculate your taxable profits for Income Tax and Corporation Tax purposes.

When the government ends the scheme

You will have until 31 March 2021 to make a Job Retention Bonus claim after which the scheme will close. No further claims will be accepted after this date.

UKFT is in constant dialogue with the government and is outlining the latest support available for UK fashion and textile businesses on our website. We will update this page as new guidance becomes available or the situation changes.

UKFT CORONAVIRUS GUIDANCE