If your mental model of sick pay was formed before April 2026, two parts of it
are now wrong. Both changes came in through the Employment Rights Act 2025, and
both take effect the moment you are off sick.

Change one: the three waiting days are gone

The old rule was that Statutory Sick Pay started on the fourth day of illness.
The first three qualifying days paid nothing at all — which meant that for
the great majority of absences, which are short, SSP paid nothing at all.

Since 6 April 2026, SSP is paid from the first day of illness.
A three-day absence that used to be worth nothing is now worth three days of
sick pay.

This is the change most likely to be worth money to you. Short
absences are far more common than long ones, and they were exactly the ones the
old rule excluded.

Change two: the lower earnings limit is gone

The second rule was quieter but hit harder. You used to have to earn above a
weekly threshold to qualify for SSP at all. Below it, you got nothing — and
the people below it were overwhelmingly part-time workers, many of them on
multiple jobs.

That limit has been removed. Lower earners now qualify, and instead of the flat
weekly rate they receive a percentage of their normal weekly earnings. In
practice: if the flat rate would be more than you normally earn in a week, you get
the percentage instead, so sick pay never exceeds your actual wage.

Our Statutory Sick Pay calculator
applies both rules, so you can put in your own weekly earnings and see which one
applies to you. The current rate and percentage are listed, with their source, on
our rates and thresholds page.

What has not changed

  • SSP still runs for a maximum of 28 weeks in any one period of
    sickness.
  • It is still the legal minimum, not the norm. Plenty of
    employers pay contractual sick pay well above it — full pay for a set number
    of weeks is common. Check your contract before assuming SSP is what you will
    get.
  • Your employer can still ask for proof. Self-certification
    covers the first seven days; beyond that a fit note from a healthcare professional
    is normal.
  • SSP is taxable and goes through payroll like ordinary pay.

Why this changed

The reasoning behind removing the waiting days was straightforward: a sick pay
system that pays nothing for the first three days gives people a financial reason
to come to work ill. That is bad for them and worse for everyone they work
alongside. Whatever you make of the wider Act, this particular change has a clear
logic to it.

If you were off sick before April 2026

The old rules applied then. This is not retrospective, and there is nothing to
reclaim for an absence that happened under the previous system.

What to do if you think you have been underpaid

Start with your payslip and your contract: work out whether you were being paid
SSP or contractual sick pay, because they are different things and only one of
them changed. If it looks like SSP was not paid from day one for an absence after
6 April 2026, raise it with payroll in writing.

If that does not resolve it, Acas gives free advice, and there is a formal route to
dispute an SSP decision through HMRC.