Help Maternity Pay - NHS - Not sure if I should go back to work

[Kriistina]

Hi All,

I need you help and advise, i work for the NHS and I'm yet to submit my Maternity Leave Application, however I'm not sure yet if i would be ready to go back to work after my Maternity leave, im in two minds either to go back due to the financial reasons or not return back due looking after my baby.

I am currently thinking of selecting GROUP 1 however I am worried if I decide not to return to work they will ask for a lot of money back in the end. The policy states I will have to repay the full OMP amount and I am struggling to work it out how much this will be?

Question - How much OMP will I have to pay back if i go with Group 1 but then decide I am not ready to come back at all. ( Salary details below )

I have two options from NHS policy:

Group 1 - If i Decide to come back ( Minimum 3 months)

• 8weeks full pay including SMP
• 18 weeks on half pay plus the flat rate SMP (or average weekly earnings, whichever is lower)
• 13 weeks on SMP flat rate
• 13 weeks Unpaid

Group 2 - If i Decide not to come back

• 6 weeks at 90% of your Normal pay
• 33 weeks on flat rate SMP or 90% of your average weekly earnings, whichever is lower
• 13 weeks Unpaid

My Background

• Over 2 year Service with the NHS
• Band 4 ( Before Tax £22549 - After Tax/Deductions per month £1648.47

Thank you so much for reading this through, sorry its abit long :(

Sorry I can’t process the numbers but just wanted to say in my experience as an nhs manager, most people take option 1 and if they go on to not come back, pay it back slowly. You may be glad of an option to return to some form of work (maybe reduced hours). You may also be desperate to stay home with your little one.

Double check how long you have to go back for. If it’s 3 months and you’ll have 27 days annual leave then you’re not going back for long. You could go back and suck it up for a month and a half in order to get the extra money. My personal recommendation would be to do that, but that’s got a million caveats because I don’t know you etc. if you decide that SAHM-life isn’t for you (and it really isn’t for everyone, I was happy to go back to work) then you don’t leave much of an option if you’ve already said you won’t. Financials aside, I don’t think you should close the door on work if you’re not sure. It’ll be harder to find and start a job the other side of mat leave.

@Potatomashed Thank you so much for the response. I am going to try and speak to HR maybe and try to find out of a rough figure of how much I pay need to repay back as I totally tried to figure it out with my husband for couple hours and it is too complicated :D But thank you again and it is nice to get any advice :)

@ReeseWitherfork yes it does mention on the policy that I will have return at least for minimum of 3 months not to repay anything back or to find another job within NHS otherwise I will have to repay the full OMP back. Thank you also for the advice - I will for sure still deciding and trying to consider different options available just really dont want to make the wrong choice. My head is a bit all over the place at the moment if I am honest. Thank you :)

If I've interpreted what you've said correctly, then you'd have to pay back the equivalent of 9 weeks wages, as that's the difference between OMP and SMP?
I'm not sure how it works with tax and deductions etc. But I'd assume it would end up being (very roughly) just over £3300.

If you aren't going to need it desperately then you could always put the equivalent OMP into a savings account as you get it, and then if you don't go back to work it will be sat there ready to pay back and you'll be no worse off than if you'd said you weren't going back at the beginning, and if you do decide to go back then you can spend it worry free afterwards.

I did misread it actually. I've worked it out very roughly and the difference will be more like £4,100 (which is roughly 10/11 week's pay I think)

I ended up not going back to my NHS job. To avoid having to pay back, I used annual leave from before my ML, my AL from during and worked 5 shifts in 2 weeks then I was free to go! L

My colleague took all of her annual leave after maternity leave, then gave a sick note for the extra six weeks, therefore, then resigned. The leave and sick note totalled the three months and she paid nothing back 🤯

As pp pointed out you will have all your annual leave and bank holidays to take. If you have some from before and after that could end up as much as 2 months. Could your partner then take 2 or three weeks holidays and you could maybe beg some free childcare from family or friends for a week or two. That way you keep your options open and get the money. You may well want a job to go back to, you don’t know how you will feel in a years time.