I am sure by now you have heard yesterday’s announcement by the PM in relation to the JobKeeper payment.
Under the JobKeeper Payment, businesses impacted by the Coronavirus will be able to access a subsidy from the Government to continue paying their employees. Affected employers will be able to claim a fortnightly payment of $1,500 per eligible employee from 30 March 2020, for a maximum period of 6 months. The payment will be administered by the ATO and paid to the employer to be passed onto the employee. Each employer will be required to register to receive the payments. Employees do not need to do anything.
Employees who have been stood down, but are still employed should be eligible for the payment. This means that employees of businesses that shut down due to various restrictions – such as cafes, restaurants, theatres, casino workers and the like – will continue to be paid even if they are not working.
The JobKeeper payment is also available to the self-employed (businesses without employees) such as sole traders.
The first payment should be delivered in the first week of May, but backdated to 30 March 2020.
A fact sheet with further details for EMPLOYERS can be found here.
A fact sheet with further details for EMPLOYEES can be found here.
Until legislation is available we will not have any further detail from which to advise eligibility, however, we will keep you updated as information comes to hand. We appreciate that this payment may be welcome news for many.
JobSeeker Payment
The PM also made additional announcements in relation to the JobSeeker payment:
- Eligibility has been expanded. At the moment, Australians out of work are not eligible for the JobSeeker payment if their partner earns $48,000 or more. Under these new changes, people will be eligible for job-seeker payments unless their partner earns $79,762 or more. (This will help those who have lost jobs but have a spouse still working to access the Job Seeker Package announced last week).
- If you have applied for the job seeker payment prior to your employer offering to put you back on payroll (in order to access the JobKeeper payment); you need to update services Australia of your new income.
Useful Links
If you wish to find more information on the Governments’ Economic Response to the Coronavirus, these two links may be useful:
https://treasury.gov.au/coronavirus
https://www.ato.gov.au/individuals/dealing-with-disasters/in-detail/specific-disasters/covid-19/