Wage Subsidy 3.0

The Government has this afternoon set out the criteria for a new nationwide wage subsidy covering the period that Auckland is at COVID-19 Alert Level 3.

The new wage subsidy runs alongside the existing wage subsidy extension – which remains open until 1 September for eligible businesses. The criteria for the new wage subsidy are similar to the current extension: In particular, a business must have had, or is predicting to have, a revenue drop due to Covid-19 of at least 40 per cent. For this new scheme, the revenue drop applies for any consecutive period of at least 14 days within 12 August and 14 September compared to last year.

MSD has advised the new wage subsidy scheme will be open for applications by the end of this week, Friday 21 August.

The government has also announced that it has removed the revenue-drop and ‘negatively impacted’ tests for the COVID-19 Leave Support Scheme. This means businesses with workers who have been told by health officials or their medical practitioner to self-isolate will receive the equivalent of the wage subsidy to help cover that person’s wages for the time they cannot be at work.

The mortgage deferral scheme is also being extended from its current end-date of 27 September, to 31 March 2021. Further details will be made available by the Reserve Bank and the retail banks.

Feel free to contact us if you have any queries following the government’s announcement or how to deal with employees following the change in alert levels. We are experts in all things HR and provide free, no obligation first consults to employers and if you are registered with the Regional Business Partner Network, you may qualify for our professional services up to a value of $5,000.00 at no cost to you or your business – contact us on 0800 HR FOR U to learn how to apply if you have not already.