Giving staff time off for jury service
Paying staff on jury service
You don’t have to pay staff while they’re doing jury service, but many employers do.
If you pay your employee
If you carry on paying your employee, work out the tax and National Insurance contributions in the normal way.
You can’t claim back money you’ve paid the employee or that the business has lost during the jury service.
If you don’t pay your employee
If you don’t pay your employee, they can claim a loss of earnings allowance from the court.
You’ll need to fill in a certificate of loss of earnings for your employee. They’ll get one with their jury service letter.
If their jury service lasts longer than 3 months, put ‘Yes’ in the ‘Irregular payment pattern indicator’ field in your Full Payment Submission (FPS).
If you top up their allowance
You may decide to top up your employee’s allowance so they don’t lose out on pay.
You’ll need to fill in a certificate of loss of earnings for your employee. They’ll get one with their jury service letter.
To work out the top-up payment, subtract the court allowance from your employee’s usual take-home pay. This will give you the amount you need to give your employee.
Use your payroll software to work out the ‘net to gross’ amount, and deduct tax and National Insurance from it.
When your employee returns to work
An employee on a cumulative tax code may have some unused Personal Allowance when they return to work.
Your payroll software will work out if they have less tax to pay on their next payday, or if they’re entitled to a tax refund.
Apply to get help if you can’t pay for this yourself.