Starting new job pregnant - maternity benefit eligibility

[befuddledmum]

Hi all,

I'm new here and am hoping someone could give me some guidance around my current situation.

I accepted an offer to join an investment bank from 1 Feb. While working through the notice period of my previous job, I found out I was pregnant! This is very exciting as I had a miscarriage a few months ago. However it means I will now be starting my new job pregnant which is definitely not ideal. If the pregnancy goes well, I would go on maternity leave shortly after my probation period (6 months).

I am keen to understand whether I would be eligible for any maternity pay as I understand many companies say the maternity benefits are subject to 12 months of continuous employment prior a certain point of your pregnancy.

Are there any fellow bankers out there that can share the maternity policies of their companies? I would also be keen to understand how this situation is handled in other industries.

Will I get anything? Should I work on the assumption that I will get nothing?

Thank you so much for your help!

I don’t work for a similar company but if you get nothing from your employer look up maternity allowance.

There's different pay schemes that are known as 'mat pay'

There's Matrrnity allowance (MA). Statutory Maternity pay (smp) or Enhanced Maternity pay.

Enhanced is the usually the one you have to work for an employer for a certain amount of time to get.

It means that your employer tops you wage up above SMP for a set time.

It usually varies massively employer to employer. Some might have enhanced pay but you normally need to have been there x time to qualify. You'll probably find yours on the intranet or similar.

You won't qualify for SMP but should be able to claim Maternity Allowance

I’m in a different industry (legal) but I’m afraid I’ve never had an employer who offers enhanced unless you’ve worked for them at least for some period before you become pregnant.

Equally SMP from memory requires continuous employment from around conception with that employer. Personally I’d work on the assumption I’d be getting maternity allowance and view any additional as a bonus.

Where I work you need to of had 12 months of continuous employment upon start of leave to qualify for enhanced maternity pay.

You still get maternity pay/allowance tho. If I remember rightly it was about £136 per week. I may be wrong with that tho as my youngest is 6.

Congratulations on your pregnancy

@AlDanvers

There's different pay schemes that are known as 'mat pay'

There's Matrrnity allowance (MA). Statutory Maternity pay (smp) or Enhanced Maternity pay.

Enhanced is the usually the one you have to work for an employer for a certain amount of time to get.

It means that your employer tops you wage up above SMP for a set time.

Wrong. To qualify for SMP you have to not have been pregnant when you changed jobs.

I was in the same position and whether or not you get SMP or MA depends on how long you will have worked there by a particular point in the pregnancy. I didn’t qualify for SMP but I’m getting MA from the government (£150 a week, almost).

Maternity allowance is around £152 now.
It differs from SMP in that SMP has a 6 week period at 90% of salary and MA doesnt and is a set amount throughout.

And this is why you don’t post questions like this on AIBU!

Google reckons

‘You'll get £151.97 a week or 90% of your average weekly earnings (whichever is less) for 39 weeks if you're employed or have recently stopped working. You can get Maternity Allowance for up to 39 weeks. This means if you take the full 52 weeks Statutory Maternity Leave, your final 13 weeks will be unpaid.’

You probably wouldn't. But it may be tricky finding out without alerting them to your pregnancy before you have had a chance to get through a large chunk of probation.

Their policies might be on an intranet in which case you won't have to ask them so that would be good.

If you're very senior they might bend the rules a bit if they are keen to have you I guess

To get SMP you need to have worked for 26 weeks by the time you are 25 weeks pregnant so can't be pregnant when you start work

Have you read your contract to see what it says? To be honest it’s unlikely you’ll get enhanced pay but like pps have said you should get maternity allowance.

Isn’t it usually 26 weeks of continuous service before due date/EWC?

If you don’t qualify for enhanced, or SMP there’s M allowance.

@WouldIBeATwat how is it wrong?

You don't have to work for an employer for 12 months to get smp. Usually just before conception.

I didn't state wether op would qualify for smp or not.

Enhanced Mat pay, tops up SMP. If you dont qualify for SMP, you won't qualify for for EMP.

That's not necessarily true. Some places may offer enhanced pay even if the employee doesn't qualify for SMP

I got maternity allowance when I started my job pregnant, although I became pregnant again during maternity leave and got the highest rate of mat pay from the company second time round as although I was barely back before being off again, my mat leave was counted as service.

No you wouldn't qualify for statutory maternity pay as you wouldn't have been employed for 26 continuous weeks by the qualifying week, which is the 25th week of pregnancy.

On that basis, it's unlikely you'd qualify for any enhanced maternity pay from your employer, but you'd have to check your company policy.

Thank you all for the responses!

@ShadowPuppets - That's exactly my approach right now, i.e. work on the assumption that I only get maternity allowance and if I'm lucky to be working for an unusually generous company, I may get something additional.

If I'm extremely unlucky to be working for a not-so-nice company, I may not even make it past probation due to my pregnancy (of course they will blame it on poor performance instead). In the case where I don't make it past probation, I believe the resulting financial situation would be the same, i.e. I only get maternity allowance?

This is far from the ideal way to start a new job but I am so happy to be pregnant that it all doesn't really matter As my previous colleagues always say, there's never a good time to be pregnant. Just got to work it out one step at a time.

I see on the UK government website that I am required to inform my employer about my pregnancy at least 15 weeks before the beginning of the week the baby is due. Is it possible that company policies would require more than that?

Unfortunately I don't yet have access to the company policies (as I have not started and it was not provided with my contract) but I wanted to be mentally prepared in order to manage the stress.

Thank you!

Honestly you’re asking people to guess your companies policies, which vary from company to company

You are going to have to tell them within the first few weeks and it’s likely you will be visibly pregnant before the 15 weeks time frame. The government guidance is at least 15 weeks so of course they may require more.

Congrats on the pregnancy!

Company policies usually state something along the lines of as soon as possible, but by 15 weeks to go. In your position I'd tell them as late as possible to get through as much probation if you're concerned they will let you go.

The pay question has been covered, but yes you'll need to claim maternity allowance as you won't be entitled to SMP and you will probably not get enhanced mat pay (but check the policy when you start!)

Probation is a red herring here. You don’t have any statutory rights against dismissal for non-discriminatory grounds for 24 months from starting.

So they can’t sack you for being pregnant at any time, but they can for other reasons for up to 2 years.

I am from this industry. It is highly unlikely their internal policy would ask for more notice than 15 weeks before your due date. They tend to follow the general legislation on the matter. Most banks wouldn't offer enhance maternity pay until youve worked there for 2 years. So either way you will end up with the maternity allowance.
In your shoes I would talk to your line manager sooner rather than later.. Sometime between 12 weeks and 20 weeks and explain the situation and your plans, i.e. When do you plan to start maternity, what handover you will do and how long do you plan to take off for maternity leave. Legally it would be hard to fight back if you are dismissed, but I would concentrate on making sure they see value in keeping you.