From 6th April 2026, the right to Statutory Sick Pay (SSP) changed in ways that most employees will celebrate and most employers will not. The three-day waiting period is gone. The lower earnings threshold is gone. Sick pay is, at least on paper, a day-one right. But dig into the actual rules – many of which date back to the Statutory Sick Pay (General) Regulations 1982 (the ‘SSP Regulations’) – and a more nuanced picture emerges. HR professionals who understand the detail will be far better placed to manage absence costs and protect their organisations than those who take the headlines at face value.

What Changed on 6 April 2026

Two reforms came into force under the Employment Rights Act 2025:

The three waiting days are gone. Previously, SSP only kicked in from the fourth qualifying day of absence. That acted as a natural deterrent to short-term absence. SSP is now payable from the first qualifying day, meaning even a one-day absence now potentially attracts a payment.

The lower earnings limit is removed. Employees previously needed average weekly earnings of at least £125 to qualify. That threshold is abolished. SSP is now calculated at the lower of £123.25 per week or 80% of the employee’s average weekly earnings – meaning lower-paid and part-time workers who previously fell below the threshold now qualify for the first time.

A HR focus on the ‘small print’

SSP is not a guaranteed day-one right if the employee has not yet carried-out any work.

The requirement that an employee must have commenced work before becoming entitled to SSP has not changed. An employee who accepts a job offer but is sick before they have carried out any work at all does not qualify. Where someone joins on a Monday and phones in sick before attending, SSP is not payable. This is worth communicating clearly in induction materials.

Your notification rules are a legitimate lever – but they have limited ‘teeth’

Although sickness absence policies often require notification by a certain time on the first day of absence (for example, ‘before 9am on the first day of absence’), this does not mean that SSP can be withheld if notification comes after 9am on the first day. The SSP Regulations state that employers can only withhold SSP on ‘failure to notify’ grounds if the employee fails to comply with a reporting requirement which is set (at the earliest) as the end of the first day of absence. Earlier notification requirements can be set for any contractual sick pay entitlement, but not for SSP.

SSP is only ever paid on qualifying days

SSP is not calculated on calendar days; it is paid only in respect of qualifying days – the days an employee is contractually required to work. An employee who works Mondays and Tuesdays, and falls sick across a week, can only receive SSP in respect of those two days. Qualifying days are usually determined by the employment contract. If you have employees whose working pattern is part-time and fairly static but whose contractual ‘qualifying days’ do not reflect that, consider amending the contract to reflect the actual working pattern.

Phased returns may now trigger SSP payments on non-working days

When the SSP changes were being debated in Parliament, it was noted that they may result in employees who were undertaking a phased return following sickness absence being entitled to receive SSP. Prior to April 2026, if an employee with a full-time job returned from a period of sickness on a phased 3-day week for a period, they would not be entitled to SSP on the two nominally ‘non-working’ days as these would fall within the three ‘waiting days’. Now that ‘waiting days’ have gone, there is at least an argument that SSP would be payable on phased returns which are structured in this way. The way around this is to agree a temporary variation to the employment contract for the phased return period so that the employee’s contractual working hours during this period are synced with the phased return itself.

Linked periods of incapacity can stack up quickly.

Where two periods of sickness are separated by eight weeks or less, they link together and are treated as one continuous period when looking at whether the overall right to 28 weeks of SSP has been exhausted. Under the old rules this had limited practical effect because of the waiting days; now it means that an employee who has a run of short absences over several months can quickly build up SSP use without ever having a lengthy single absence. Clear records should be kept of absence dates to make sure that linked absences are accurately tracked.

Practical steps for HR

  • Audit your sickness absence policy now if you haven’t already done so. Remove any reference to waiting days or the lower earnings limit. These provisions no longer apply and leaving them in creates confusion and potential liability.
  • Sharpen your notification procedure. Make it explicit: the deadline, who the employee must contact and the consequence of late notification. Consider having separate deadlines for SSP (no earlier than the end of the first working day of absence) and contractual sick pay (which can legitimately be earlier).
  • Ensure your payroll system has been updated to reflect the new rate structure and the removal of the three-day wait.
  • Brief your line managers. Particularly on phased returns, notification obligations and what they should and should not say when an employee calls in sick on their first day.
  • Consider a cultural audit of the business’s approach to attendance. Employers should give some thought to how to create a workplace culture that incentivises attendance without penalising the genuinely sick. If avoidable absence is minimised then the impact of the new SSP regime will be reduced.