04 April 2023 
Julia Ascott, Employment Taxes Specialist
HMRC has published ‘promotional material’ setting out the risks within a labour supply chain, of not paying the correct wage because there could be a number of parties between the end client (i.e. the university) and the worker.
This promotional material sets out the common causes of underpayments, examples to help you identify areas of risk and how to mitigate those risks, the latter stating:
“These examples are guidelines to help you avoid underpaying your workers:
Universities using agencies, umbrella companies and any other suppliers that will provide labour as part of their services should review these risks to ensure that there will be no reputational impact should a party in the chain be underpaying its staff. We understand that many university procurement teams require providers to confirm they pay their staff above NMW or NLW, or Real Living Wage (where universities are accredited).
