As a business owner or manager, you need to be ready for the increase in minimum wage rates from Thursday, 1 April 2021.
The adult minimum wage will go up, from $18.90 to $20.00 gross per hour, and the starting-out and training minimum wage will go up from $15.12 to $16.00 gross per hour.
Employment New Zealand has information to help you prepare.
If you have employees on the minimum wage, you should send them a letter or email (variation of employment contract) advising them of the new wage.
Talk to whoever runs your payroll system: your payroll provider, accountant, lawyer, and HR or finance people to make sure they are ready to implement the change. If your system is manual or computer-based you should check and confirm the settings will be adjusted for the new rates.
If any of your employees are on starting-out or training wages, check when they will be eligible to move onto the adult rate. Check that any affected employment agreements (contracts) are updated.
Consider potential impacts due to internal wage relativity (eg how employees are paid compared to each other) and external benchmarking (eg how your pay rates compare to others in your industry or sector).
Apply increased costs to your budgets, to help you plan for the effect of higher wage and holiday pay liabilities.
For more information go to employment.govt.nz – use search word Minimum wage
