Notice periods: minimum payment rights
Payment rights during notice periods and in lieu of notice and compromise agreements.
An employee who continues to work during the period of notice is entitled to receive normal pay and benefits - including pay rises - for that period in line with their employment contract.
Employees with specified normal working hours
Employees whose contract specifies normal working hours and whose employment is terminated with notice are entitled to receive a minimum average hourly rate for any normal working hours during the notice period that they are:
- ready and willing to work, but no work is provided
- unable to work due to sickness or injury
- absent from work wholly or partly because of pregnancy, childbirth or paternity, adoption, parental bereavement, shared parental or parental leave
- on holiday, in accordance with the terms of employment
Employees without specified normal working hours
Employees whose contract does not specify normal working hours are entitled to receive at least a week's pay during the notice period for each week that they are:
- ready and willing to do work of a nature and amount to earn a week's pay
- unable to work due to sickness or injury
- absent from work wholly or partly due to pregnancy, childbirth or paternity, adoption, parental bereavement, shared parental or parental leave
- on holiday, in accordance with the terms of employment
These minimum payment rights apply whether it is the employer or the employee who gives notice. If the employee gives notice, the employer can delay making the payments until the employee leaves at the end of the notice period - and does not have to make the payments at all if the employee goes on strike during the notice period.
The minimum average hourly rate of pay is a week's pay divided by the number of normal weekly hours. There are legal rules for calculating a week's pay for this purpose. To find out how to calculate pay, see our guide on pay: employer obligations.
Contractual notice period
Where the employee is not working during the notice period the employee will lose the statutory right to full pay during the notice period where the contract requires the employer to give at least one week more than the minimum statutory notice. The employee in such a case will be paid in accordance with the contract of employment, which may be statutory sick pay, full pay, half pay, or whatever other contractual rights apply during lay-off, sickness, etc. It is important to seek legal advice before withholding notice pay from employees on family-related leave.