Hiring, Payroll & Employment
in the United Kingdom

El salario y la compensación en el Reino Unido están regulados por diversas leyes y normativas:

• Minimum Wage: The National Minimum Wage and National Living Wage rates vary by age and are reviewed annually. 
• Pago de las horas extraordinarias: No existe ningún requisito legal para el pago de horas extraordinarias, pero los empresarios deben garantizar que el salario medio por el total de horas trabajadas no sea inferior al Salario Mínimo Nacional. La remuneración de las horas extraordinarias suele especificarse en los contratos de trabajo.

En el Reino Unido se celebran varios días festivos. Entre ellos figuran:

• Año Nuevo
• Viernes Santo
• Lunes de Pascua
• Fiestas de principios de mayo
• Vacaciones de primavera
• Vacaciones de verano
• Día de Navidad
• Día de San Esteban

Además de éstos, cada nación del Reino Unido (Inglaterra, Escocia, Gales e Irlanda del Norte) puede tener días festivos adicionales específicos de su región.

En el Reino Unido, los trabajadores por cuenta ajena tienen derecho a varios tipos de permisos, entre los que se incluyen:

• Vacaciones anuales: La normativa sobre tiempo de trabajo de 1998 da derecho a los trabajadores a 5,6 semanas de vacaciones retribuidas al año, que pueden incluir los días festivos.
• Baja por enfermedad: Los trabajadores tienen derecho a una baja por enfermedad de hasta 28 semanas si están demasiado enfermos para trabajar.
• Baja por maternidad: Hasta 52 semanas, con un máximo de 39 semanas remuneradas.
• Permiso de paternidad: Dos semanas de permiso retribuido.
• Permiso parental compartido: Hasta 50 semanas, con un máximo de 37 semanas remuneradas.
• Permiso parental: Hasta 18 semanas de permiso no retribuido por cada hijo.
• Permiso por duelo parental: Dos semanas de permiso retribuido.
• Permiso por familiares a cargo: Permiso razonable no retribuido para hacer frente a emergencias relacionadas con personas dependientes.
• Servicio de jurado: Permiso no retribuido mientras dure el servicio de jurado.

El despido en el Reino Unido puede producirse en varias circunstancias:

• Capacidad: Relativa a la capacidad del empleado para desempeñar su trabajo.
• Conducta: Relativo al comportamiento del trabajador.
• Despido: Cuando el puesto ya no es necesario.
• Ilegalidad o infracción legal: Si la continuación del empleo contraviene una ley.
• Algún otro motivo sustancial: Que justifique el despido.

Los empresarios deben prever periodos de preaviso adecuados en función de la duración del servicio, que oscilan entre una y doce semanas. El despido inmediato sin preaviso puede producirse en caso de falta grave.

En el Reino Unido, las empresas están obligadas a contratar determinados tipos de seguros:

• Seguro de responsabilidad civil patronal: Cubre las reclamaciones de los empleados por lesiones o enfermedades sufridas como consecuencia de su trabajo.
• Pension Contributions: Although not a form of insurance, employers must automatically enroll eligible employees into a qualifying workplace pension scheme and make contributions.

You can employ someone in the UK without establishing your own local company by using an Employer of Record, or EOR. The EOR becomes the worker’s legal employer while your organisation manages their day-to-day role.

A UK EOR arrangement can support employment contracts, payroll, tax deductions, statutory benefits and ongoing employment administration. Before the arrangement begins, the proposed role, working practices, right-to-work position and employment status should be reviewed.

Need to employ someone in the UK? Discuss your EOR requirement with us.

The total cost of employing someone in the UK includes more than salary. Depending on the employee and arrangement, it may include employer taxes and National Insurance, workplace pension contributions, paid holiday, statutory payments, benefits and employment administration.

The cost should be calculated using the employee’s salary, working hours, benefits, pension position, employment terms and any immigration requirements. Current tax rates, statutory thresholds and employee entitlements should be applied when the estimate is prepared.

Get a UK employment cost estimate.

A standard EOR cannot sponsor a worker who is supplied to and managed by a client. Home Office guidance does not permit an employment agency, employment business or intermediary to sponsor a worker and then supply that person as labour to another organisation.

The client may be able to hold the sponsor licence and sponsor the worker where it has genuine responsibility for the person’s duties, functions and outputs. Project Global can potentially provide legal employment or payroll administration alongside the client’s sponsorship, but the structure must be reviewed carefully and must comply with National Minimum Wage and Working Time requirements.

Discuss a UK employment and sponsorship structure

Employers must be satisfied that each person they employ has the right to perform the proposed work in the UK. The prescribed check should be completed before employment starts, with a follow-up check where the person has time-limited permission to work.

Depending on the person’s status and documents, the check may be completed using an appropriate manual document check, a digital verification service or the Home Office online checking service. The Employer Checking Service can be used in certain circumstances where the person’s status requires confirmation from the Home Office.

Checks should be applied consistently. Employers should not make assumptions about someone’s right to work based on nationality, name, accent, ethnicity or appearance.

Check the onboarding requirements for your proposed UK worker.

You can engage a genuinely self-employed contractor in the UK, but the arrangement must reflect how the person will work in practice. Using a contractor agreement or requiring the person to work through a limited company does not, by itself, establish self-employed status.

Relevant considerations include whether personal service is required, who controls what work is done and how it is performed, whether there is an obligation to offer and accept work, and whether the individual is genuinely operating an independent business. HMRC’s Check Employment Status for Tax tool can support the tax-status assessment.

IR35 is the common name for the UK’s off-payroll working rules. The rules are intended to ensure that a contractor who provides services through an intermediary, but would have been an employee if engaged directly, pays broadly the same Income Tax and National Insurance as an employee.

IR35 can still be relevant when the contractor provides services through their own limited company. The appropriate assessment depends on the contractual terms and the actual working arrangements, including personal service, control and the parties’ ongoing obligations.

Check whether the proposed engagement may fall within IR35.

The relevant question is not simply where the client is incorporated. The off-payroll position depends on the parties involved, the contractor’s intermediary, the working arrangement and the statutory rules that apply to that engagement.

A cross-border client should not assume that using an overseas company, foreign contract or UK limited-company contractor automatically removes UK tax and classification considerations. The engagement should be reviewed before work begins to establish which party has responsibility for determining status and operating any required deductions.

Request a review of your cross-border contractor arrangement.

A contractor who is treated as self-employed may have to be treated differently for tax or employment-rights purposes if the actual relationship points towards worker or employee status. Potential consequences can include unpaid tax and National Insurance, statutory employment rights, holiday-pay exposure and disputes over responsibility between the parties.

The employment-status label used in the contract is not always decisive. The courts and authorities may consider how the arrangement operates in practice and may disregard written terms that do not reflect the true relationship.
A classification assessment should therefore address both tax status and employment rights rather than treating IR35 as the only relevant risk.

Request a UK worker-classification assessment