Hi, An apprentice recently stopped coming to work, her mum

Hello again, thanks for your patience. Your liabilities for SMP and SSP will be entirely separate and there are different requirements for paying each of them.

First of all be careful with just treating this as a resignation when the employee has not indicated she wishes to resign. I know she has said she will not be attending work but you need to check the reasons for that, such as whether there is a health-related issue that prevents her from working because in that case you cannot just assume she wants to resign and doing so could amount to discrimination. So go back and check the reasons for not wishing to return, whether this is just temporary and if she is going off sick or if she is actually leaving her employment – but don’t assume, you need to delve a bit deeper into this before you make a decision.

Assuming that she does want to leave then you will not have to pay SSP once her employment has terminated. However if she continues to be employed by you, you would have to pay her SSP as long as she is signed off sick and she earns the lowest earning threshold for NI contributions, that being £111 per week. If she earns that she is entitled to SSP whilst still employed by you.

Her entitlement to SMP would depend on how long she was employed by you on a specific date. By aw she needs to have worked for you continuously for at least 26 weeks up to the ‘qualifying week’, which is the 15th week before the expected week of childbirth. She needs to have earned at least £111 a week for the preceding 8 weeks as well. If she meets these criteria, then you need to pay her SMP even if she later stops working for you.

I hope this has answered your query. Please take a second to leave a positive rating, or if you need me to clarify anything before you go - please get back to me and I will assist further as best as I can. Thank you

I understand but you should not just jump to conclusions - just because she is moving closer to her partner's does not necessarily mean she wants to resign and it could be she goes off sick for a period of time and continues being employed by you so to protect yourself you need to get more details and find out her intentions rather than just assuming she wants to resign

Ok I understand but you are assuming things here, she has not mentioned resignation and it is ambiguous. Hence why you need to ask her to confirm if she is resigning rather than assuming