This article discusses the eligibility criteria for employees to be part of the JobMaker Hiring Credit Scheme and explains the components of the JobMaker Eligibility Report. This report is designed to provide employers with the information to make an informed decision on which employees fit the basic eligibility criteria provided by the government.
The results displayed in this report do not take into account all eligibility criteria. Specifically, what is not catered for in the report is the following:
- Whether the employee received the JobSeeker Payment, Youth Allowance or Parenting Payment for at least 28 consecutive days (or two fortnights) within the 84 days (or six fortnights) before commencing employment.
- Whether the employee has not already provided a JobMaker Hiring Credit employee notice to another current employer.
The above criteria will be verified by the employee when they submit the employee notice to you.
Additionally, this report makes no assumptions as to whether a business is eligible for the JobMaker Hiring Credit Scheme. It is the employer's responsibility to determine eligibility. For more information about the subsidy and business eligibility, refer here.
Employee eligibility criteria
The specific criteria employees must meet to be eligible for the JobMaker scheme are as follows:
- Must be aged 16 to 35 years at the time they started employment.
- Must have started employment between 7 October 2020 and 6 October 2021 (inclusive).
- Need to have completed a minimum average of 20 hours (worked or paid) per week during the time they were employed in the JobMaker period. Hours of paid work include paid overtime, paid leave and paid absences on public holidays. It does not include any unpaid leave. This is referred to as the minimum hours requirement and is explained in further detail below.
- Need to have received the JobSeeker Payment, Youth Allowance (other than on the basis that the individual was undertaking full-time study or was a new apprentice) or Parenting Payment for at least 28 consecutive days (or two fortnights) within the 84 days (or six fortnights) before commencing employment. This include days that have a nil payment.
- Have submitted a JobMaker Hiring Credit employee notice to the employer.
- Have not already provided a JobMaker Hiring Credit employee notice to another current employer.
Refer here for more information and scenarios relating to employee eligibility.
JobMaker Eligibility Report
The JobMaker Eligibility Report easily allows employers to determine the eligibility status of their employees and whether they satisfy the minimum hours requirement. You can access this report by navigating to Reports > Employee > JobMaker Eligibility Report.
NB: Only active employees (i.e not employees classed as incomplete or terminated) will appear in the report.
The report can be filtered using the following:
- Pay Schedule
- Employing Entity
- Employee Default Location
The report will show the following results per employee in order to then determine eligibility:
- Start date: Employment commencement date;
- Age at start date: This is the employee’s age as at their start date, displayed in whole years, i.e if someone’s age was 18 yrs and 3 months, the value displayed will be 18 years.
- Average weekly hours: This is provided to determine the minimum hours requirement and is calculated by averaging the number of hours worked by the employee in all finalised pay runs (including any adhoc pay runs processed where the employee is included) commencing from the first full pay period on or after the later of 7/10/2020 or the employee’s start date. If you click on the tooltip next to the hours displayed, this will show a breakdown as to how the average hours were calculated.
Using the example above, the figures displayed in these columns are calculated as follows:
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- JobMaker pay period: Looks at all finalised pay runs commencing from the first full pay period on or after the later of 7/10/2020 or the employee’s start date.
- Hours Worked: This is the number of hours processed in the pay run.
- Weeks in pay period: This is the number of weeks covered in each pay run, for eg a weekly pay run = 1 week; a fortnightly pay run = 2 weeks; a monthly pay run = 4.3333 weeks.
- Average hours per week: This is the number of hours worked divided by the number of weeks in the pay period.
- Total average hours: This is the sum of all hours worked divided by the number of weeks from the start date of the first JobMaker pay period to the end date of the last JobMaker pay period. Using the screenshot above as an example, the start date of the first JobMaker pay period is 2/11/20 and the end date of the last JobMaker pay period is 24/1/21. This equates to 12 weeks. Additionally, the number of total hours worked is 76 hrs x 6 pay runs = 456 hours. Divide 456 by 12 to give you a total of 38 average hours.
Refer below for more detail on the minimum hours test.
- Eligibility status: The value here will be either ‘Eligible’ or ‘Ineligible’. In order to classify an employee as eligible, ALL the following criteria must be met:
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- Employee’s start date is on or after 7/10/20 and before 7/10/21
- Employee’s age at their start date is between 16 to 35 years old (inclusive)
- Total average hours = 20 or more
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If one or more of the above criteria is not met the employee will be deemed ineligible. Just a reminder here that, as explained at the start of this article, the report does not take into consideration whether the employee received income support payments or has submitted an employee notice to another employer to determine eligibility. Rather, the employee will make a declaration on these criteria when submitting their employee notice to you.
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Ineligibility reasons: There will only be a value here if the employee’s eligibility status is deemed ineligible. The ineligibility reasons applicable are as follows:
- Start date is before 7/10/2020
- Start date is after 6/10/2021
- Less than 16 years of age on commencement of employment
- More than 35 years of age on commencement of employment
- Average hours worked is less than 20 per week
More than one of the above ineligibility reasons can be listed for an employee, where applicable.
You are able to export the report in PDF, excel and CSV formats.
Minimum hours requirement
The minimum hours requirement tests the average hours worked (either paid hours of work or actual hours worked) over the JobMaker periods. As a reminder, the JobMaker periods are as follows:
As part of processing JobMaker in the pay run, employers need to also report JobMaker periods in the pay run. An employer must only process a JobMaker period for each eligible employee if they have met the minimum hours test per JobMaker period. Further information on processing JobMaker periods in the pay run can be found here. In order to determine whether your eligible employee meets the minimum hours requirement per JobMaker period you will need to look at the pay runs falling within that period to determine whether the average hours worked are 20 or more.
If the hours worked by your employee are less than 20 in one JobMaker period you cannot report that JobMaker period in the applicable pay run. However, if the employee meets the minimum hours requirement in a subsequent JobMaker period then you must report that JobMaker period in the applicable pay run.
Should you have any questions, feel free to email us at support@yourpayroll.com.au.