b'Maternity Pay & Lea veStatutory Maternity Pay is often an area of worry and concern for parents as it is often incorrectly assumed that they will incur large costs should their nanny become pregnant and go on Maternity Leave.Whilst there is indeed a direct inconvenienceYour nanny will need to have started work for and perhaps increased indirect costs you (as ayou 41 weeks before her expected week of small employer) will not have to pay the costconfi nement (due date, often referred to as an of your nannys Statutory Maternity Pay (SMP). EWC). As a rule of thumb this means that if your nanny is already pregnant when she starts Statutory Maternity Pay is paid to employeesher work with you it is unlikely she will qualify that have (a) worked for an employer for afor Statutory Maternity Pay from you.long enough period (b) are still working for the employer at a specifi c time and (c) haveShe will also need to still be in your been paid enough during a set period. If theseemployment 15 weeks before her baby is due, criteria are not met then your nanny will needso if her contract comes to an end before that to make a claim for Maternity Allowance usingpoint this will eliminate her entitlement for a form SMP1. Statutory Maternity Pay.Finally, she needs to be earning an amount of money that is over the lower earnings limit (please call NannyPaye for the current rates).Assuming these criteria are all met your nanny then needs to pass to you her MATB1 certifi cate which gives you her official due date. This certifi cate is then forwarded onto our office so we can make a fi nal assessment of her claim for SMP, if we feel she is not entitled to the money we shall return the MATB1 back to you along with a form SMP1 so she can make her own claim for Maternity Allowance from the Job Centre Plus.Assuming she is entitled to SMP your nanny should then decide when she would like to stop working for you and start her paid Maternity Leave. This can be up to 11 weeks before her baby is due.Before you start any payments to your nanny NannyPaye requests from HMRC a cheque to cover all of your maternity costs including the PAYE Tax and NIC payments. This leaves parents without the burden of having to wait for HMRC to refund money whilst paying out an additional salary to a cover nanny.'