Any adult aged between 18-70 qualifies and can be picked at random from the electoral roll –unless they have a very strong reason not to attend they will be required to do so.
They can be absent from work anywhere up to 10 days – longer for serious cases so talk about this possibility before they start.
You are legally required to grant this time off but you are not required to pay them, although many companies do as a goodwill gesture – you need to consider if you can afford to do this as you may need to employ temporary staff to cover. The employee on jury service can claim ‘loss of earnings’ allowance from the courts.
If loss of earnings allowance applies to your employee then the court will ask you to confirm how much your they earn – the allowance will not be subject to TAX and NIC as it counts as compensation. If you decide to ‘top-up’ the allowance to make up the full net salary it will require that both PAYE and NIC be paid on this portion – we can help you with this calculation as the difference needs to be ‘grossed up’.
If you decide this course is not affordable then it is likely that the employee will build up un-used tax allowance and will receive a refund on return depending on their coding basis.
For more information call us on 01908 561770 or email us on info@burtonbandini.co.uk
