Maternity allowance

[ellesabe]

Hi all,

I thought there might be a separate forum for maternity pay discussions bug I couldn't find it so feel free to redirect me if I'm posting this in the wrong place!

After having dd1 I have gone back to work 1day a week and we are starting to think about trying for dc2 so are looking into what my maternity pay might look like on my new hours.

I don't earn enough to pay National Insurance which means that I don't qualify for Statutory Maternity Pay but it seems I might be eligible for Maternity Allowance instead.

I was just wondering if anyone had any experience of claiming Maternity Allowance and could share any advice - the whole process seems more complex than SMP!

Thanks in advance for your insights :)

Elle x

Have you looked on the direct.gov.uk website? They have useful info about MA. If I recollect though you need to be working a certain amount of hours over a certain period and it sounds like if you only work 1 day a week you wouldn't qualify. But I may very well be wrong.

No, 1 day a week (self employed) was fine for me, as long as you pay your NI contributions. I wouldn't do it myself (didn't need to) but a friend was just short of the right amount and paid self employed contributions for a couple of weeks just to make it up to the right amount.

Information on DirectGov here.

As long as you will have been back at work for at least 26 weeks and earn at least £30 a week you should get MA.

You can take your highest average earnings over any consecutive 13 weeks in the 66 weeks up to the week before your baby is due, so if there is overtime available it might be worth putting in a push for three months, although don't leave it too late because your employer will probably take care not to let you get over the threshold for SMP in the last 8 weeks.

You will get 90% of this average for 39 weeks.