Newsflash: National minimum wage – guidance

What do we already know?

We updated you in our June 2015 Newsflash National minimum wage – guidance that the Government had published useful, updated guidance on the national minimum wage (NMW). The guidance is intended to assist employers comply with the NMW regulations and includes information on who is entitled to NMW and help with calculating it.

What’s new?

The Government has updated the above guidance, available here, and has also updated its guidance on national minimum wage (NMW) enforcement, to take account of recent changes, available here. This guidance sets out how the revised scheme to name and shame employers who break national minimum wage (NMW) law will operate and other civil and criminal enforcement strategies. Recent developments in this area include:

• An increase in the maximum penalty for non-compliance with the NMW, which rose from 100% to 200% of the underpaid wages on 1 April 2016 (subject to an overall maximum of £20,000 per underpaid worker, which remains unchanged).
• The new role of the Director of Labour Market Enforcement, created under the Immigration Act 2016.
• New enforcement rules for “repeated or very serious” breaches of labour market legislation.