National Minimum Wage Naming Scheme, Round 16: educational bulletin
Source: data.gov.uk (2021-08-09)

Employers who fail to pay National Minimum or National Living Wage. Under a revised scheme announced on 11 February 2020, the naming of employers will resume. This process will call out businesses failing to pay their workers the National Minimum Wage and failing to comply with NW legislation rules. The scheme was paused in 2018 and came into force 6 April 2020.

National Minimum Wage Naming Scheme  
Round 16, December 2020: educational bulletin 
 
Introduction 
The National Minimum Wage Naming Scheme exists to increase awareness of 
National Minimum Wage Legislation and to act as a deterrent to the minority of 
employers who may be tempted to underpay their workers.  
In 2018 the Government undertook a review of the Naming Scheme in order to 
ascertain its effectiveness and ensure Naming was used in the most efficient way. 
The review was published on 11th February 2020 and can be found here: Naming 
employers who fail to pay minimum wage to be resumed under revamped rules.  
As part of this review the Government has committed to be more transparent about 
the types of breaches we most commonly find. This bulletin includes statistics 
regarding breaches of National Minimum Wage legislation in this naming round, and 
some information on the most common type of breach among employers in this 
naming round.  
 
 

Employers named in Round 16 
 
 
 

Main reasons for minimum wage underpayment in Round 16 
 
Table 1 below shows the most common minimum wage breaches identified for 
employers named for minimum wage underpayment in Round 16.  
Breaches most commonly associated with employers include: 
• deducting pay from workers’ wages,  
• failing to pay workers for working time, and  
• paying below the apprenticeship rate.  
Table 1. Main reasons for minimum wage underpayment in Round 16 
 
Type of 
underpayment 
Further information 
Deductions or 
payments that 
take pay below 
the minimum 
wage 
Deductions include: 
• Food / meals 
• Parking permits travel costs 
• Cost of, or lost, work equipment and / or Personal 
Protective Equipment 
• Stock or till shortage 
• Training costs 
• Christmas savings schemes 
• Uniform 
• Childcare costs 
• Salary sacrifice schemes 
• Worker purchase of clothes to meet dress code 
Unpaid working 
time takes pay 
below the 
minimum wage 
Unpaid working time includes: 
• Additional work before and after a worker’s shift 
• Rounding clock-in time to the nearest hour 
• Travel time 
• Issues with final pay where employment has come to 
an end 
• Pay is delayed / underpaid due to cashflow / 
cessation in trading / or ad hoc payments 
• Paid for ‘regular’ hours or day rate, but a worker has 
worked for more time than this 
• Incorrectly classifying a worker as salaried– and the 
fixed salary does not cover all of the hours worked 
Failure to pay the 
correct rate to 
apprentices  
This includes instances where a worker: 
• Is an apprentice aged over 19, and has completed 
the first year of their apprenticeship 
• Is incorrectly classified as an apprentice and paid the 
apprentice rate 

Type of 
underpayment 
Further information 
• Has finished their apprenticeship but has not had 
their pay increased to reflect the higher minimum 
wage rate to which they are entitled 
Failure to pay the 
uprated minimum 
wage 
This includes: 
• Failure to increase a worker’s pay when they become 
eligible for a new minimum wage rate following a 
birthday 
• Failure to uplift after the increase to the minimum 
wage rates on the 1st April 
Hourly rates of 
pay below the 
minimum wage 
The worker’s / workers’ hourly rate is below the minimum 
wage rate to which they are entitled 
Failure to 
correctly apply the 
accommodation 
offset 
This includes: 
• Accommodation rate above offset 
• Living accommodation not provided 
Worker status 
error 
This includes instances where the worker is incorrectly 
treated as self-employed 
Note: Some employers had underpayments for more than one reason. 
 
We find that deductions and payments from the worker to the employer that take pay 
below the minimum wage are the most common reason for underpayment.   
Common risks of non-compliance include: 
• A worker voluntarily purchasing goods or services from the employer, if the 
employer allows the worker to purchase them via deductions from pay; 
• A worker incurring costs from expenditure connected with the job – for 
example PPE, uniform, meals, training or travel costs. 
The information below provides a brief outline of the common risks and links to more 
detailed guidance. 
What counts as pay for minimum wage purposes? 
Minimum wage is calculated by determining the worker’s total remuneration in a pay 
reference period and checking that the average hourly rate of pay for that period is at 
least the relevant minimum wage rate.   
For further information on what counts as pay for minimum wage purposes and on 
the steps to ensure compliance, please consult Calculating the Minimum Wage. 

Deductions from pay that reduce pay for minimum wage purposes 
Certain deductions from a worker’s pay, or payments made by the worker to the 
employer, reduce pay for minimum wage purposes.  
A deduction, or payment from a worker to an employer (or to a third party), becomes 
a minimum wage issue when it risks reducing the worker’s pay below their minimum 
legal entitlement. This requires consideration of: 
• Deductions an employer makes from a worker’s pay; 
• Deductions from a worker’s pay which are paid by the employer to a third 
party; 
• Payments a worker makes to their employer; and 
• Payments a worker makes to a third party (whether or not it is reimbursed).  
A payment will not reduce pay for minimum wage purposes if (i) a worker chooses to 
buy goods or services from their employer which are not required in connection with 
their employment, and (ii) the worker pays for the goods or services via a payment 
to the employer. 
However, if the same purchase is paid for via a deduction from wages then this will 
reduce pay for minimum wage purposes, even if the worker freely chooses to make 
the purchase and/or signs their agreement to the purchase. 
Payments and deductions are often made in connection with the issues set out 
below (note that the issues listed are not exhaustive). 
• Uniforms 
• Meals 
• Transport 
• Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) 
• Saving Schemes 
• Salary sacrifice arrangements 
For further information see: Deductions from pay and payments by workers that 
reduce minimum wage pay 
Deductions that will not reduce a worker’s pay for minimum wage purposes 
• Living accommodation- providing the amount deducted is not more than the 
accommodation offset. For more information see National Minimum Wage 
and Living Wage: accommodation.  
• Deductions to account for an accidental overpayment of wages. 
• Payments to a third party a worker asks an employer to deduct from their pay, 
for example a trade union subscription. 
• Other deductions relating to tax and National Insurance contributions as these 
are not for the employer’s own use and benefit. 

For further information see: Deductions from pay and payments by workers that do 
not reduce minimum wage pay, and scroll down to deductions that do not reduce 
pay. 
Record-keeping 
Employers’ records must be sufficient to show that they are paying each worker at 
least the minimum wage for every pay reference period worked. Employers must be 
clear on what elements count as pay for Minimum Wage purposes and they must 
ensure that any deductions made do not take the worker’s pay below the minimum 
wage rate. Please consult Calculating the Minimum Wage: record-keeping 
 
Further sources of information 
Workers and employers can contact the Acas Helpline on xx-xxxx-xxxx or visit their 
website for free, confidential and impartial advice. Additionally, workers who believe 
that they have been underpaid the Minimum Wage can submit a complaint to HMRC 
here. 
HMRC will protect the anonymity of workers who make a complaint and will follow up 
on every worker complaint received, even those which are anonymous. This includes 
complaints made to the ACAS helpline, via the online complaint form and those 
received from other sources.  
The Government has also produced an online tool to help workers discover if they may 
have been underpaid, see National Minimum Wage and Living Wage calculator for 
workers. 
For more information on National Minimum Enforcement see National minimum 
wage law: enforcement, and for enforcement statistics from the 2018/19 financial 
year see the Enforcement and Compliance report.