Guarantee payments

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Practice notes

In-house COVID-19

Guarantee payments

Published by a ��˾��ҹ�� Employment expert

Practice notes

In-house COVID-19

This Practice Note explains the right to a guarantee payment, which provides limited pay protection for certain employees who are laid off or put on short-time working.

In practice the question whether a guarantee payment is due will usually arise in the case of hourly paid or piece rate Workers because they are most likely to be working under contracts which give the employer the right to lay off without pay.

The basic right

The basic right to a guarantee payment is set out in section 28 of the Employment Rights Act 1996 (ERA 1996). An employee is entitled to a guarantee payment for any ‘workless day’. This is a day throughout which the employee would normally be required to work but the employer does not provide the employee with work (see: The need for a ‘workless day’ below).

The employer’s failure to provide the employee with work must be for one of the prescribed reasons (see: Reasons for the failure to provide work below).

The level of pay protection is modest:

•
a maximum amount is payable per day

Jurisdiction(s):

United Kingdom

Key definition:

Workers definition

What does Workers mean?

A term that includes employees and also other groups such as agency workers or anyone carrying out work who is not genuinely self-employed.

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