“The human race is faced with a cruel choice: work or daytime television” – squaring lockdown with the Job Retention Scheme (UK)
A well-known term of the CJRS is that the employee shouldn’t while on furlough do any work for the employer or provide any services to it. A simple enough proposition, one might think, despite the unknown pundit whose wise words appear above, but as with much of this Scheme, once you get down into the weeds of it, questions inevitably arise at the margins. Here are our thoughts on some we have received: Should we cut off the email access of furloughed employees? This was based on some fairly strident Covid-19 guidance put out by the CIPD, which includes the statement that “ even tasks such as basic administration, replying to customer care emails or briefing colleagues with handover information are services…..and may count as work ”. If HMRC later audited email folders for the relevant period and saw such activity, for example, could the employer be required to pay anything back, let alone (as the CIPD suggests) “ all the payments under the Job...