Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme statistics: November 2020
Published 25 November 2020
© Crown copyright 2020
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Overview
This is the sixth release of Official Statistics on the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (CJRS). This release provides analysis of claims for periods up to 30 September 2020. The data used includes claims submitted to HMRC by 31 October 2020.
The data for July onwards is incomplete as claims relating to these months may still be filed, thus, the figures for July onwards should therefore be considered preliminary results and will be revised in the next release.
This release extends the daily time series presented in the last release up to the end of September and also includes analysis of the use of CJRS as at 30 September.
Claims data for periods after September 2020 is currently too incomplete to produce reliable figures. Statistics on the use of the CJRS in October and onwards will be included in future publications.
We will continue to publish more CJRS statistics in future months. These statistics are Experimental Statistics and are subject to revisions. Further information is provided later in this publication.
The government announced the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (CJRS) on 20 March 2020. CJRS supports employers in paying their employees. Employers have been able to claim CJRS support for employees furloughed from 1 March 2020.
Up to 30 June 2020, CJRS provided employers with financial support of up to 80% of their employees’ salaries. This support is capped at £2,500 per month per employee. Employers were also able to claim Employer National Insurance and minimum automatic enrolment pension contributions.
Starting from 1 July 2020, except in certain exceptional circumstances, staff who have not already been furloughed under the scheme may not be included in claims for support. Further changes from the start of August, September and October – as described later in this bulletin – gradually reduced the total level of support available for each furloughed employee up to the end of October.
The government has announced an extension to the CJRS to support individuals and businesses who are impacted by disruption caused by coronavirus (COVID-19). The CJRS will remain open until 31 March 2021. For claim periods from November 2020 to January 2021, employees will receive 80% of their usual salary for hours not worked, up to a maximum of £2,500 per month. The £2,500 cap is proportional to the hours not worked.
The government will review the policy in January to decide whether economic circumstances are improving enough to ask employers to contribute more.
Contact details
For queries or feedback on this publication, please contact:
For press queries, please contact:
- Dan Allen, tel: 03000 585 024
- Lisa Billard, tel: 07773 091 264
Next release
The next release will be published on 17 December 2020.
Main points
The key points from this release covering the period to 30 September 2020 are below. Figures for July onwards are provisional and subject to revision as additional claims for the period are received. Figures for July and August 2020 in this release have been revised to take into account claims made since the previous release of these statistics was published.
- the CJRS claims data for July onwards is not yet complete as claims for periods from 1 July onwards may still be made. This means that the figures for July, August and September are preliminary and are likely to be revised upwards in the next release
- following on from the last release which covered the period to 31 August, preliminary estimates show that furloughing of staff across all sectors continued to decrease up to 30 September
- since the peak of 8.9 million employments furloughed on 8 May, followed by reductions in June, preliminary figures show that the number of employments furloughed continued to fall throughout July and August to 5.2 million at 31 July and 3.6 million at 31 August
- Preliminary figures show that the number of employments furloughed continued to reduce during September to 2.4 million at 30 September. These figures are based on incomplete data and will be revised in the next release. It is estimated that this figure will increase by around 12% to 2.7 million once all returns are received
- the figures for the end of July and August have been revised since the October release and it is estimated that the final figure for 31 July could be in the region of 5.3 million once all returns are received and revisions made. Similarly, it is estimated that 31 August figure could be revised upwards to in the region of 3.7 million once all returns are received
- furloughing of staff in the wholesale and retail sector peaked on 24 April at 1.9 million employments. At 30 September, initial figures show 390,700 jobs furloughed in this sector – a decrease of more than 78% since the peak for the sector
- as at 30 September, the sector with the highest proportion of its workforce eligible for furlough that were actually furloughed was arts, entertainment and recreation at 23%, followed by accommodation and food services sector at 22%. In all, 45% of employers in the arts, entertainment and recreation sector were using the furlough scheme at the end of September as were 41% of employers in accommodation and food services
- across all employer sizes, the number of employments furloughed continued to decrease between 31 August and 30 September
- overall, where it was possible to link the data, across the UK, 1.22 million women were furloughed at 30 September compared with 1.16 million men. This is a decrease of 552,500 women and 463,100 men when compared to 31 August
- preliminary estimates show there was broad consistency in furlough rates across the nations and regions of the UK at the end of September (provisional data). London had the highest take-up rate of 10% against the UK average of 8%
- in most countries and regions more women than men were furloughed at 30 September, the greatest exception to this being the West Midlands where 99,200 women were furloughed and 104,100 men. The latest data at 30 September also shows that in London slightly fewer women (225,300) were furloughed than men (228,800)
- 201,500 employers were using flexible furlough at the end of September for at least one job. In total over 925,800 employments were on flexible furlough at the end of September – about 38% of all furloughed employments
- at 48%, the accommodation and food services sector had the highest proportion of employments furloughed flexibly
- based on the preliminary data for 30 September, Wales had the highest proportion of employments furloughed flexibly. The South West had the highest proportion of employments on flexible furlough of all the English regions, at 35%
About the data in this release
The data used in this release comprises the CJRS claims made up to 31 October 2020. Where possible, this data has been matched with other HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) data to enable additional analysis to be presented. As previously, this bulletin includes breakdowns of CJRS claims as follows:
-
the number of employments furloughed by day, also broken down by sector and employer size
-
the number of employments furloughed by day, for July onwards broken down by:
- country and region
- gender
- age
- type of furlough (fully furloughed or flexible (partial) furlough)
New additions/ expanded tables:
- Figures for the use of CJRS as at 30 September by:
- employer size
- sector
- country and region, including a gender breakdown
- local authority, including a gender breakdown
- parliamentary constituency, including a gender breakdown
- age, including a gender breakdown
- region and sector
These statistics have been produced using data from both the CJRS and HMRC’s Pay As You Earn (PAYE) Real Time Information (RTI) system. Following user feedback, we continued to include details of the number of employments furloughed each day.
We would welcome any further feedback from users. This should be sent to CJRS.Statistics.Enquiries@hmrc.gov.uk. User responses will then be taken into consideration when developing future releases.
For these statistics, an ‘employer’ is defined as a PAYE scheme, and ‘employments’ are defined according to the CJRS criteria. Further details are within the background section.
As with previous releases, where we have been unable to match the CJRS claims with other HMRC data, we have denoted this as ‘unknown’ in the tables within this release.
The release reports a CJRS take-up rate for both employers and employments, where appropriate. The take-up rate has been calculated using PAYE RTI data, to estimate the eligible population of both employers and employments. An individual with employments with more than one employer is counted once for each employment furloughed.
Rounding has been applied to the figures in the tables accompanying this release, with counts rounded to the nearest 100 and amounts to the nearest million.
Employments furloughed over time
This section of the release presents the number of employments furloughed each day from the scheme’s start up to 30 September 2020. The figures for 1 July 2020 onwards are based on incomplete data and should be considered provisional and subject to change. This is because claims for staff furloughed from the start of July onwards can be submitted until 30 November.
It is estimated that the overall total number of people furloughed at the end of September will be in the region of 12% higher once all claims are submitted and revisions applied. A further consequence of this is that the available data is not complete enough to reasonably reliably extend the daily series after the end of September.
While the job retention scheme was announced on 20 March 2020, claims for furloughed staff could be made extending back to 1 March 2020 for jobs which had already been furloughed in the period 1 March to 19 March 2020. Therefore, the daily series included in this release starts before the scheme was announced.
The data presented in this section comes from combining detail about furlough periods from the job level data supplied with larger claims (claims with 100 or more furloughed jobs) and the total number of furloughed staff included in each claim.
More details on the methodology can be found later in this bulletin.
The figures show the total number of employments furloughed by day. Some employees have moved on and off furlough over time.
As not all furloughed employments have been furloughed at the same time, the peak figures in the time series are lower than the cumulative total number of jobs furloughed at any time up to the end of June. This is published in the management information on the scheme and included in the August release. That figure is 9.6 million. Additional jobs could normally not be newly furloughed after the end of June.
Where figure 1 shows a reduction in the number of employments furloughed, it should not necessarily be inferred that employees have returned to work or alternatively that employments has ended. The data presented here should be interpreted in this context.
The key points to note from figure 1 are:
- initially the number of employments furloughed increased quickly following the announcement of the scheme on 20 March, reaching 4.8 million on 23 March and 6.8 million by the end of March
- following further strong growth at the start of April the number of employments furloughed increased gradually and peaked at 8.9 million on 8 May 2020
- after the early May peak, the number of employments furloughed decreased slowly before a fall of around 670,000 employments between the end of May and the start of June
- the number of employments that were furloughed then continued to reduce throughout June to 6.8 million at 30 June
- preliminary figures show that the number of employments furloughed continued to fall throughout July to 5.2 million at 31 July and 3.6 million at 31 August. These figures are based on incomplete data and will be revised in the next release
- latest preliminary figures show that the number of employments furloughed has continued to fall through September to 2.4 million at 30 September. It is estimated that this figure could be revised upwards by around 12% to 2.7 million once all returns have been received
- the figures for the end of July and August have been revised since the October release and it is estimated that the final figure for 31 July could be in the region of 5.3 million once all returns are received and revisions made. Similarly, it is estimated that the 31 August figure could be revised upwards to in the region of 3.7 million once all returns are received
Figure 1: Total employments furloughed, 1 March 2020 to 30 September 2020
Source: HMRC CJRS data
Employments furloughed over time by industry
This section breaks down the overall time series included above by the employer’s industrial sector. Figure 2 is a set of charts, one for each industrial sector. The underlying data for these charts can be found in the accompanying spreadsheet.
The key points to note from figure 2 are:
- following on from the last release which covered the period to 31 August, preliminary estimates show that furloughing of staff across all sectors continued to decrease up to 30 September
- furloughing of staff in the wholesale and retail sector peaked on 24 April at 1.85 million employments furloughed. This dropped to 1.33 million employments furloughed at 30 June. Preliminary figures for this sector show 830,900 employments furloughed at 31 July falling to 390,700 employments furloughed at 30 September
- accommodation and food services peaked at 1.65 million employments furloughed on 10 April. There was a net decline of 325,700 employments to 1.32 million employments furloughed at 30 June. Preliminary figures for this sector show 1.06 million employments furloughed at 31 July, falling to 477,900 employments furloughed at 30 September
- the manufacturing sector had a peak of 911,000 employments furloughed on 17 April. This reduced to 583,600 at 30 June. Preliminary figures for this sector show 455,500 employments furloughed at 31 July and 213,100 employments furloughed at 30 September
- in construction, furloughing peaked on 14 April with 723,600 employments furloughed, with this falling to 404,200 employments furloughed at 30 June. Preliminary figures for this sector show 295,900 employments furloughed at 31 July, falling to 147,300 employments furloughed at 30 September
- furloughing in arts and entertainment sector peaked later than other sectors on 15 May 2020 with 455,100 employments furloughed on that date. To 30 June there had been a net decrease of 61,700 employments furloughed in this sector. Preliminary figures for this sector show 329,700 employments furloughed at 31 July and 150,100 employments furloughed at 30 September
Figure 2: Total employments furloughed by industry (millions) (largest 15 sectors), 23 March to 30 September 2020
Source: HMRC CJRS data and PAYE Real Time Information
Employments furloughed over time by employer size
In addition to the sectoral breakdown we also provide a breakdown of the number of employments furloughed per day by employer size. The employer size has been calculated based on an estimate of the number of employments eligible to be furloughed. We assume a PAYE scheme to be equivalent of an employer.
Presented in figure 3 is a set of charts, one for each employer size band. The underlying data for these charts can be found in the accompanying spreadsheet.
The key points to note from figure 3 are:
- across all employer sizes, the number of employments furloughed continued to decrease between 31 August and 30 September
- 3.45 million employments were furloughed by large employers with 250 or more employments on 5 May (the peak for this category). This reduced to 2.82 million employments furloughed by 30 June. Preliminary figures for the largest employers show 1.92 million employments furloughed by 31 July, dropping to 665,400 employments furloughed by 30 September.
- large employers had the largest proportionate decrease across all employer size bands between the peak and 30 September (81%). Note that it is believed that the figures for larger employers are more subject to revision due to them submitting claims less promptly than smaller employers
- employers with 20 to 49 employments had a peak of 1.15 million employments furloughed on 16 April, compared with a peak of 795,400 for employers with 100 to 249 employments on 1 May
- employers with one employment had a peak of 295,700 employments furloughed on 20 April, compared to 219,400 employments furloughed at 30 June. A net decline of 76,300. Preliminary figures show this decreased further to 184,700 employments furloughed at 31 July and 130,400 employments furloughed at 30 September
Figure 3: Total employments furloughed (millions) by employer size (number of employees), 23 March to 30 September 2020
Source: HMRC CJRS data and PAYE Real Time Information
Employments furloughed over time by Country and Region
This section provides a geographic breakdown of the number of employments furloughed each day from 1 July up to 30 September. This is based on the residential address information that HMRC holds for employees. This does not directly translate to the employee’s usual place of work, or employer’s centre of operations which may be in a different region.
For example, an employee who lives in Wales and normally commutes daily to work in Bristol would be included within the count for Wales, rather than for South West England. At present these statistics are only available for 1 July onwards (see methodology section for more information).
Presented in figure 4 is a set of charts, one for each region. The underlying data for these charts can be found in the accompanying spreadsheet.
The key points to note from figure 4 are:
- preliminary estimates show that, across all regions the number of employments furloughed decreased from the start of July to the end of September
- on 1 July there were 4.55 million employments furloughed in England. At 31 July this had fallen to 4.10 million employments furloughed and 2.88 million at 31 August. Preliminary figures show that this has continued to drop throughout September to 2.02 million at 30 September
- in London – the English region with the most furloughed staff from July to September, there were 884,300 employments furloughed on 1 July. This decreased by 63,000 to 821,300 employments furloughed at 31 July and 611,200 employments furloughed at 31 August. This figure continued to drop throughout September to 454,100 employments furloughed at 30 September
- the number of employments furloughed in Scotland on 1 July was 477,100. At 31 July this figure had fallen to 407,200 and at 31 August was 264,200. At 30 September the number of employments furloughed was 183,200
- the number of employments furloughed in Wales was 240,300 on 1 July, this fell to 217,900 at 31 July and 141,200 at 31 August. At 30 September, the number of employments furloughed was 95,700
- on 1 July, the number of furloughed employments in Northern Ireland was 134,400. Preliminary figures for Northern Ireland show there were 114,800 employments furloughed at 31 July and 77,500 employments furloughed at 31 August. This number of employments continued to fall throughout September to 54,100 at 30 September
- as elsewhere in this release, the figures from 1 July are preliminary and subject to revision as more claims data is received
Figure 4: Total employments furloughed (millions) by country and region, 1 July to 30 September 2020, preliminary data
Source: HMRC CJRS data and PAYE Real Time Information
Employments furloughed over time by gender
This section provides new analysis showing the number of employments furloughed each day from 1 July up to 30 September, broken down by the claimants’ gender. The underlying data for figure 5 can be found in the accompanying spreadsheet. At present these statistics are only available for 1 July onwards (see the methodology section for more information).
The key points to note from figure 5 are:
- since 1 July, more employments have been furloughed with female job holders than where the employee was male
- for employments where the employee was female, preliminary figures show that there were 2.82 million employments furloughed on 1 July. This decreased to 2.52 million at 31 July and 1.78 million at 31 August. At 30 September this figure had reduced to 1.22 million employments furloughed
- for employments where the employee was male, there were 2.64 million employments furloughed on 1 July. This reduced to 2.39 million at 31 July and 1.63 million at 31 August. This figure continued to decrease throughout September to 1.17 million at 30 September
- the August CJRS statistics release reported cumulative figures for the March to June period. Over that period more jobs with male employees than female employees were furloughed. That finding refers to jobs that were furloughed at any time until the end of June when CJRS closed to additional employees being furloughed (rather than any specific point in time)
- as elsewhere in this release, figures from 1 July are preliminary and subject to revision
Figure 5: Total employments furloughed by gender, 1 July to 30 September 2020, preliminary data
Source: HMRC CJRS data and PAYE Real Time Information
Employments furloughed over time by age
This section provides analysis for the number of employments furloughed each day from 1 July up to 30 September, broken down by age band. The claimant’s age is calculated at 1 March 2020. Figure 6 is a set of charts, one for each age band. The age bands have been expanded since the last release to include a 25 to 34, 35 to 44, 45 to 54, and a 55 to 64 breakdown.
The underlying data for figure 6 can be found in the accompanying spreadsheet. At present these statistics are only available for 1 July onwards (see methodology section for more information).
The key points to note from figure 6 are:
- preliminary figures show that across all age bands the number of employments furloughed decreased between 1 July to 30 September
- at 22%, the highest proportion of employments furloughed were held by employees in the 25 to 34 age group. This was followed by the 35 to 44 and 45 to 54 age groups with 20%. The under 18 age group had the lowest proportion of employments furloughed, at 30 September, with 2%.
- figures 12 and 13 and their accompanying commentary later in this bulletin show that the under 18s and 65 and over age groups had the highest take up rates for furloughing at 11%
- for employments where the employee was aged 25 to 34, the number of employments furloughed was 1.26 million on 1 July, the highest across all age bands. This decreased by 134,700 to 1.13 million employments furloughed at 31 July and fell further to 769,400 at 31 August. This continued to fall throughout September to 535,500 employments furloughed at 30 September
- the number of employments furloughed with employees in the 18 to 24 age band was 946,200 on 1 July. Provisional figures show this decreased to 813,900 employments furloughed at 31 July, 505,100 at 31 August and 330,500 at 30 September
- where the employee was 65 or over, the number of employments furloughed was 237,400 on 1 July. Preliminary figures for this age band show the number of employments furloughed decreased to 220,000 at 31 July, 159,700 at 31 August and 118,300 at 30 September
- as elsewhere in this release, the figures from 1 July are preliminary and subject to revision as more claims are received. More detailed analysis of the furloughed jobs at 30 September by the age of the employee, including take-up rates, can be found later in this release
Figure 6: Total employments furloughed (millions) by age of employee, 1 July to 30 September 2020, preliminary data
Source: HMRC CJRS data
Employments furloughed over time by furlough type
This section provides a breakdown of the overall time series by employments furloughed full time and part time. On 1 July, the option was introduced for employers to furlough their employees for part of their usual hours, with the employee free to work the remainder. Therefore, the time series shown in figure 7 starts at 1 July.
The underlying data for figure 7 can be found in the accompanying spreadsheet.
All figures and findings in this time series are based off preliminary data and are subject to change.
The key points to note in figure 7 are:
- the number of employments furloughed on a full-time basis has decreased throughout July, August and September. The number of employments on full time furlough was 4.39 million at 1 July. This fell to 3.86 million at 31 July and 2.36 million at 31 August. At 30 September there were 1.48 million employments furloughed full time
- the number of employments claimed for while the employee was working some of their usual hours has remained steady since this was made possible on 1 July. At 1 July there were 1.10 million such employments, there had been a small drop to 1.07 million at 31 July.
- although the number of partially furloughed employments has remained relatively constant across July, August and September, the jobs flexibly furloughed during this period may have changed over time. Some employments may have moved between full and partial furlough, others may have returned to work and some employments may have been terminated.
Figure 7: Total employments furloughed by furlough type, 1 July to 30 September 2020
Source: HMRC CJRS and PAYE Real Time Information. Office for National Statistics licensed under the Open Government Licence v.3.0. Contains OS data © Crown copyright and database right 2020
Furloughing by employer size at 30 September
Where it has been possible to match CJRS data to Pay As You Earn (PAYE) Real Time Information (RTI), we have estimated the size of each employer in terms of number of employees potentially eligible for CJRS support.
For this data, we have assumed that PAYE scheme is the equivalent to an employer. For some employers, this is not an exact one-to-one equivalent. For example, some organisations operate multiple payrolls for different groups of employees and in other situations, a group of companies may pool their payrolls together under one PAYE scheme. However, in our view PAYE schemes provides a reasonable proxy for employers for the purposes of this release.
The employer size has been calculated based on an estimate of the number of employments eligible to be furloughed.
The key points to note from tables 1a and 1b are, as at 30 September:
- provisional figures for 30 September show 29% of employers had staff furloughed at that date under CJRS and 8% of employments were furloughed
- as at 30 September, employers with 20 to 49 employees were most likely to have claimed under CJRS to support the furloughing of staff, with 48% of employers of this size having at least 1 employee furloughed
- employers with 250 or more employees had a provisional total of 665,400 employments furloughed at 30 September. However, this represents just 4% of employments eligible across employers of this size
Table 1a: CJRS claims by employer size as at 30 September – employer level
| Employer size | Employers furloughing staff | Take-up rate | Value of claims made for periods to 30 September (£ million) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 130,000 | 18% | 1,133 |
| 2 to 4 | 210,800 | 32% | 3,593 |
| 5 to 9 | 91,700 | 38% | 3,658 |
| 10 to 19 | 54,700 | 40% | 3,909 |
| 20 to 49 | 42,500 | 48% | 5,848 |
| 50 to 99 | 13,500 | 46% | 3,644 |
| 100 to 249 | 7,900 | 46% | 4,128 |
| 250+ | 5,000 | 43% | 15,396 |
| Unknown | 600 | - | 48 |
| Total | 556,700 | 29% | 41,356 |
Source: HMRC CJRS and PAYE Real Time Information data
Table 1b: CJRS claims by employer size as at 30 September – employment level
| Employer size | Employments furloughed | Eligible employments | Take-up rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 130,000 | 727,600 | 18% |
| 2 to 4 | 372,800 | 1,682,900 | 22% |
| 5 to 9 | 285,400 | 1,547,800 | 18% |
| 10 to 19 | 261,900 | 1,792,700 | 15% |
| 20 to 49 | 329,500 | 2,615,200 | 13% |
| 50 to 99 | 185,600 | 1,977,600 | 9% |
| 100 to 249 | 196,600 | 2,606,900 | 8% |
| 250+ | 665,400 | 17,402,300 | 4% |
| Unknown | 10,000 | - | - |
| Total | 2,437,200 | 30,353,200 | 8% |
Source: HMRC CJRS and PAYE Real Time Information data
Note: the number of employments furloughed in the unknown size category is not directly comparable with the number of employers in the equivalent category in table 1a.
Furloughing by sector at 30 September
This section presents analysis of CJRS claims according to the primary economic sector of employers’ activity. The take-up rate is also reported in this table for both employments and employers. This is presented in tables 2a and 2b, below.
Key points from these tables are, as at 30 September:
- the sector with the highest proportion of its workforce eligible for furlough that were actually furloughed was arts, entertainment and recreation at 23% followed by accommodation and food services sector at 22%. In all, 45% of employers in the arts, entertainment and recreation sector were using the furlough scheme at the end of August as were 41% of employers in accommodation and food services
- the wholesale and retail sector were responsible for the greatest total value of claims up to the end of September at £7.7 billion. Accommodation and food services, and manufacturing were the two sectors with the next highest values of claims to date by the end of September, with £6.5 billion and £5.0 billion claimed respectively
More details on this are available in the methodology section.
Table 2a: CJRS claims by sector as at 30 September 2020 – employer level
| Sector | Employers furloughing staff | Take-up rate | Value of claims made for periods to 30 September (£ million) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Agriculture, forestry and fishing | 3,200 | 10% | 125 |
| Mining and quarrying | 300 | 25% | 97 |
| Manufacturing | 37,200 | 37% | 5,024 |
| Energy production and supply | 300 | 26% | 92 |
| Water supply, sewerage and waste | 1,800 | 33% | 222 |
| Construction | 62,500 | 27% | 3,682 |
| Wholesale and retail; repair of motor vehicles | 84,100 | 35% | 7,695 |
| Transportation and storage | 21,500 | 29% | 2,389 |
| Accommodation and food services | 53,900 | 41% | 6,506 |
| Information and communication | 34,100 | 22% | 1,247 |
| Finance and insurance | 7,900 | 23% | 382 |
| Real estate | 14,800 | 32% | 721 |
| Professional, scientific and technical | 86,100 | 27% | 3,197 |
| Administrative and support services | 53,000 | 32% | 3,922 |
| Public administration and defence; social security | 200 | 3% | 47 |
| Education | 13,200 | 34% | 1,261 |
| Health and social work | 26,800 | 27% | 1,523 |
| Arts, entertainment and recreation | 18,100 | 45% | 1,853 |
| Other service activities | 32,300 | 35% | 1,214 |
| Households | 1,500 | 2% | 42 |
| Unknown and other | 3,800 | - | 115 |
| Total | 556,700 | 29% | 41,356 |
Source: HMRC CJRS and PAYE Real Time Information data and Inter-Departmental Business Register
Table 2b: CJRS claims by sector as at 30 September – employment level
| Sector | Employments furloughed | Take-up rate |
|---|---|---|
| Agriculture, forestry and fishing | 7,500 | 4% |
| Mining and quarrying | 2,200 | 4% |
| Manufacturing | 213,100 | 9% |
| Energy production and supply | 1,000 | 1% |
| Water supply, sewerage and waste | 8,600 | 5% |
| Construction | 147,300 | 11% |
| Wholesale and retail; repair of motor vehicles | 390,700 | 9% |
| Transportation and storage | 117,900 | 9% |
| Accommodation and food services | 477,900 | 22% |
| Information and communication | 90,700 | 7% |
| Finance and insurance | 22,900 | 2% |
| Real estate | 41,800 | 10% |
| Professional, scientific and technical | 221,900 | 10% |
| Administrative and support services | 231,200 | 8% |
| Public administration and defence; social security | 3,400 | 0% |
| Education | 70,700 | 2% |
| Health and social work | 113,400 | 3% |
| Arts, entertainment and recreation | 150,100 | 23% |
| Other service activities | 107,600 | 19% |
| Households | 2,000 | 1% |
| Unknown and other | 15,500 | - |
| Total | 2,437,200 | 8% |
Source: HMRC CJRS and PAYE Real Time Information data and Inter-Departmental Business Register
Furloughing by countries and regions at 30 September including gender breakdown
We also provide a geographic breakdown of CJRS claims based on the residential address information that HMRC holds for employees. This does not directly translate to the employee’s usual place of work, or employer’s centre of operations which may be in a different region.
For example, an employee who lives in Wales and normally commutes daily to work in Bristol would be included within the count for Wales, rather than for South West England.
Figure 8 shows the number of furloughed employments by each of the English regions, and the totals for Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. For some employments it has not been possible so far to link the employment to the employees’ area of residence and these are included in the unknown category.
The key points from figure 8 are as at 30 September (provisional figures):
- London and the South East accounted for over 783,800 of the furloughed employments
- the East Midlands and West Midlands had a total of 357,600 employments furloughed under CJRS
- Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland combined had 333,000 employments claimed for under CJRS
- overall, where it was possible to link the data, across the UK, 1.22 million women were furloughed at the end of September compared with 1.17 million men
- for 46,700 employments it has not been possible to link the furloughed employments to other HMRC data to determine the region of residence and gender of the furloughed employees
- in most countries and regions more women than men were furloughed at 30 September, the greatest exception to this being the West Midlands where 99,200 women were furloughed and 104,100 men
Figure 8: Employments furloughed as at 30 September, by Country and Region and gender
| Region | Female | Male | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| London | 225,300 | 228,800 | 454,100 |
| South East | 176,600 | 153,100 | 329,700 |
| North West | 123,200 | 120,500 | 243,700 |
| East | 116,500 | 100,700 | 217,200 |
| West Midlands | 99,200 | 104,100 | 203,300 |
| South West | 94,600 | 82,000 | 176,500 |
| Yorkshire And The Humber | 84,500 | 82,000 | 166,600 |
| East Midlands | 80,000 | 74,300 | 154,300 |
| North East | 38,000 | 35,900 | 73,900 |
| Wales | 49,000 | 46,700 | 95,700 |
| Scotland | 93,400 | 89,800 | 183,200 |
| Northern Ireland | 27,400 | 26,700 | 54,100 |
Source: HMRC CJRS and PAYE Real Time Information
Figure 9 shows the take-up rate of employments furloughed within each country and region using CJRS with a gender breakdown.
The key points to note from figure 9 are, as at 30 September (provisional figures):
- preliminary estimates show there was broad consistency in furlough rates across the nations and regions of the UK at the end of September (provisional data). London had the highest take-up rate of 10% against the UK average of 8%
- as shown in figure 9, preliminary estimates show that the take up rate is similar for men and women within all regions and countries of the UK
Figure 9: Employment furlough take-up rate at 30 September, by Country and Region and gender
| Region | Female | Male |
|---|---|---|
| London | 10% | 11% |
| South East | 8% | 7% |
| North West | 7% | 7% |
| East | 8% | 7% |
| West Midlands | 8% | 8% |
| South West | 7% | 7% |
| Yorkshire And The Humber | 7% | 7% |
| East Midlands | 7% | 7% |
| North East | 7% | 7% |
| Wales | 7% | 7% |
| Scotland | 7% | 7% |
| Northern Ireland | 7% | 7% |
Source: HMRC CJRS and PAYE Real Time Information
The data for both figures 8 and 9 can be accessed from the accompanying spreadsheet.
Furloughing by Local Authority and Parliamentary Constituency at 30 September including gender breakdown
Accompanying this release is a separate file providing counts of the number of furloughed employments by Local Authority and UK Parliamentary Constituency based on each employee’s residential address.
In figures 10 and 11 we present maps representing the take-up rates for employments furloughed for both the local authorities and UK Parliamentary Constituencies. Darker shades indicate a higher take-up rate.
The key points to note for local authorities, at 30 September, are:
- Crawley had the highest take-up rate, with a rate of 14% of employments furloughed. This is followed by Haringey, Hounslow and Newham with take-up rates of 13%
- Boston was the local authority with the lowest proportion of employments furloughed at 4%. This was followed by South Holland and Barrow in Furness with a take-up rate of 5%
- Birmingham had the highest number of employments furloughed, with 41,000 employments furloughed. This was followed by Leeds with 27,300 employments furloughed. The take-up rates in these areas were 9% and 7%, respectively
- in Scotland, Glasgow City had 23,600 employments furloughed – a take-up rate of 9%. The City of Edinburgh also had a take-up rate of 9%, with 22,200 employments furloughed
- for Northern Ireland, Belfast and Newry, Mourne and Down had the highest take-up rates of 8%. Belfast had 11,200 employments furloughed
- in Wales, Conwy had the highest employment take-up rate of 9%. Cardiff had the highest number of employments furloughed with 12,800
Figure 10: Employments furloughed as a proportion of eligible employments at 30 September, by Local Authority
Source: HMRC CJRS and PAYE Real Time Information. Office for National Statistics licensed under the Open Government Licence v.3.0. Contains OS data © Crown copyright and database right 2020
The key points to note here for UK Parliamentary Constituencies, at 30 September, are:
- the rate of furloughed employments was highest in the Enfield, Southgate, Feltham and Heston, Hayes and Harlington, Tottenham and Crawley constituencies at 14%
- the rate of furloughed employments was lowest in the Scunthorpe constituency at 4%
- the West Ham constituency had the highest number of employments furloughed, with 12,700 employments furloughed. Nine of the ten constituencies with the highest number of furloughed employments fall within the London area
- the Belfast South constituency had the highest number of employments furloughed in Northern Ireland with 3,700, this represented a take up rate of 7%
- the Edinburgh North and Leith constituency had the highest number of employments furloughed in Scotland with 5,800, this represented a take up rate of 10%
- in Wales, Aberconwy had the highest employment take-up rate at 10%. The Cardiff South and Penarth constituency had the highest number of employments furloughed with 4,400 employments furloughed
Figure 11: Employments furloughed as a proportion of eligible employments at 30 September, by Parliamentary constituency
Source: HMRC CJRS and PAYE Real Time Information. Office for National Statistics licensed under the Open Government Licence v.3.0. Contains OS data © Crown copyright and database right 2020
Furloughing by age at 30 September including gender breakdown
This section of the release describes the number of employments furloughed as at 30 September by employees’ age and gender. This breakdown is based on the most up-to-date demographic information that HMRC holds on the individuals for whom claims have been made. The age of employees is calculated as at 1 March 2020.
The key points to note from figure 12 are:
- female claimants account for more of the employments furloughed than males in each of the age categories, bar 55 to 64 and 65 and over
- the 25 to 34 age band had the highest number of claimants for both females and males, 276,900 and 258,600 respectively
Figure 12: Employments furloughed as at 30 September, by age and gender of employee
| Age band | Female | Male |
|---|---|---|
| Under 18 | 25,200 | 20,200 |
| 18 to 24 | 172,800 | 157,700 |
| 25 to 34 | 276,900 | 258,600 |
| 35 to 44 | 255,700 | 236,800 |
| 45 to 54 | 248,400 | 231,900 |
| 55 to 64 | 190,700 | 194,400 |
| 65 and over | 55,100 | 63,200 |
Source: HMRC CJRS data and PAYE Real Time Information
Figure 13 shows the take-up rate of employments furloughed broken down by age and gender. The age bands have been expanded since the last release to include a 25 to 34, 35 to 44, 45 to 54, and a 55 to 64 breakdown.
The key points to note from figure 13 are, as at 30 September (provisional figures):
- at 11%, the under 18 and 65 and over age groups had the highest take up rate for both female and male claimants
- of all female claimants, the 45 to 54 age group had the lowest take up rate at 7%
Figure 13: Employment furlough take-up rate at 30 September, by age and gender of the employee
| Age band | Female | Male |
|---|---|---|
| Under 18 | 11% | 11% |
| 18 to 24 | 9% | 9% |
| 25 to 34 | 8% | 7% |
| 35 to 44 | 8% | 7% |
| 45 to 54 | 7% | 7% |
| 55 to 64 | 8% | 8% |
| 65 and over | 11% | 11% |
Source: HMRC CJRS data and PAYE Real Time Information
Full and partial furlough use by sector at 30 September
The spreadsheet file accompanying this release presents analysis that provides a sector breakdown of the figures for employments furloughed in each country and region as at 30 September. The analysis is based on where employees live rather than where they work.
Figure 14 shows the number of employments fully and partially furloughed at 30 September by sector.
The key points to note from figure 14, as per the provisional figures for 30 September:
- 201,500 employers had at least one employment on flexible furlough
- 925,800 employments were on flexible furlough, 38% of the total employments furloughed
- at 48%, the accommodation and food services sector had the highest proportion of employments furloughed flexibly
- 1.48 million employments were furloughed on a full-time basis, 61% of the total employments furloughed. Missing information on some furloughed employments – for example incomplete or not fully processed spreadsheet-type returns for employers furloughing 100 or more staff – means that whether an employee has been flexibly furloughed is not known in 1% of cases. This figure should reduce over time
Figure 14: Employments fully and partially furloughed at 30 September, by sector
| Sector | Employments fully furloughed | Employments partially furloughed | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| Agriculture, forestry and fishing | 4,900 | 2,600 | 7,500 |
| Mining and quarrying | 1,600 | 600 | 2,200 |
| Manufacturing | 118,900 | 92,500 | 213,100 |
| Energy production and supply | 800 | 300 | 1,000 |
| Water supply, sewerage and waste | 5,700 | 2,900 | 8,600 |
| Construction | 105,700 | 41,000 | 147,300 |
| Wholesale and retail; repair of motor vehicles | 242,300 | 146,300 | 390,700 |
| Transportation and storage | 74,600 | 40,900 | 117,900 |
| Accommodation and food services | 243,100 | 228,000 | 477,900 |
| Information and communication | 58,200 | 32,200 | 90,700 |
| Finance and insurance | 17,000 | 5,700 | 22,900 |
| Real estate | 30,700 | 11,000 | 41,800 |
| Professional, scientific and technical | 150,400 | 70,500 | 221,900 |
| Administrative and support services | 157,500 | 71,400 | 231,200 |
| Public administration and defence; social security | 2,300 | 700 | 3,400 |
| Education | 43,800 | 26,100 | 70,700 |
| Health and social work | 64,900 | 47,100 | 113,400 |
| Arts, entertainment and recreation | 96,100 | 50,600 | 150,100 |
| Other service activities | 53,800 | 49,600 | 107,600 |
| Households | 1,300 | 700 | 2,000 |
| Unknown and other | 6,200 | 5,300 | 15,500 |
Full and partial furlough use by Country and Region at 30 September
Figure 15 shows the number of employments fully and partially furloughed at 30 September by Country and Region. The key points to note are:
- at 44%, Wales had the highest proportion of employments furloughed flexibly
- of all English regions, the South West had the highest proportion of employments furloughed flexibly at 43%
- Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland combined had 138,600 employments furloughed flexibly
- London had the highest number of employments furloughed flexibly at 142,300, followed by the South East at 126,900
Figure 15: Employments fully and partially furloughed at 30 September, by Country and Region
| Region | Employments fully furloughed | Employments partially furloughed | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| London | 311,800 | 142,300 | 454,100 |
| South East | 202,800 | 126,900 | 329,700 |
| North West | 149,200 | 94,500 | 243,700 |
| East | 135,400 | 81,800 | 217,200 |
| West Midlands | 121,400 | 81,900 | 203,300 |
| South West | 100,300 | 76,200 | 176,500 |
| Yorkshire And The Humber | 97,600 | 69,000 | 166,600 |
| East Midlands | 91,600 | 62,700 | 154,300 |
| North East | 43,300 | 30,600 | 73,900 |
| Wales | 53,900 | 41,800 | 95,700 |
| Scotland | 108,000 | 75,100 | 183,200 |
| Northern Ireland | 32,400 | 21,700 | 54,100 |
Source: HMRC CJRS data and PAYE Real Time Information
Background
The government introduced the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (CJRS) to support employers through the COVID-19 period, this has commonly been referred to as the furlough scheme. It works by providing grants to employers of up to a maximum 80% of salary to a maximum value of £2,500 per employee (until the end of August). Up to the end of July, the scheme also met some of the cost of employer pension contributions and the employer National Insurance Contributions.
The scheme is based around HMRC’s Pay As You Earn (PAYE) system. For an employer to qualify for the scheme they need to have created a PAYE scheme by 19 March 2020. In these statistics, an employer is defined as a PAYE scheme.
The rules for an employment to qualify to be covered by the scheme are set out in guidance, and two of the key rules are that the furloughed employee must have been employed on 19 March 2020 and the employer must have submitted a Real Time Information (RTI) submission to HMRC for the employee by this date. Further information on the qualifying criteria is available online.
The scheme closed to new entrants from 30 June 2020. After this date, employers have only been able to furlough employees they furloughed for a full three-week period prior to 30 June 2020.
As a consequence of the closure of the scheme to additional employees and the minimum three-week furlough period that applied until the end of June, the final date that an employer could have furloughed an employee for the first time was 10 June 2020.
Employers had until 31 July 2020 to make any claims in respect of the period to 30 June 2020. A small number of claims have been made since this date. These claims relate to exceptions as set out in the CJRS guidance (for example, for employees being furloughed who have been absent from work and who had been paid Statutory Maternity Pay).
Changes to the scheme from 1 July
From 1 July 2020, employers have the flexibility to bring furloughed employees back to work part time. Additionally, employers have the flexibility to decide the hours and shift patterns of their employees – with the government continuing to pay 80% of salaries for the hours they do not work.
From 1 September 2020, the scheme supported 70% of salaries for hours not worked, reducing to 60% from 1 October 2020.
When claiming the CJRS grant for furloughed hours, employers will need to report and claim for a minimum period of a week. Employers have until 30 November 2020 to submit claims for support from the CJRS for employments furloughed between 1 July and 31 October.
Changes to the scheme from 1 November
The government recently announced an extension to CJRS to support individuals and businesses who are impacted by disruption caused by coronavirus (COVID-19). The CJRS will remain open until 31 March 2021. For claim periods from November 2020 to January 2021, employees will receive 80% of their usual salary for hours not worked, up to a maximum of £2,500 per month. The £2,500 cap is proportional to the hours not worked.
The government will review the policy in January to decide whether economic circumstances are improving enough to ask employers to contribute more.
Glossary
An employer is defined within this release as a Pay As You Earn (PAYE) Scheme. In some circumstances this does not map directly to what is commonly understood to be an employer. For example, some organisations operate multiple payrolls, and in other situations, a group of companies may pool their payrolls together under one PAYE scheme. However, in our view PAYE schemes provides a reasonable proxy for employers for the purposes of this release.
An employment is defined within this release as anyone who meets the scheme criteria set out within the published guidance. We have applied this definition in order to keep the presentation simple and the difficulty in separating out Office Holders (such as directors) from what are generally considered employees. Further information on the eligibility criteria is set out in the background section above.
Measuring the data
Data source and collection
The data for this release comes from HM Revenue and Customs’ CJRS claims. It covers the whole population rather than a sample of people or companies, and it will allow for more detailed estimates of the population.
The release is classed as Experimental Statistics as the methodologies used to produce the statistics are still in their development phase. As a result, the series are subject to revisions. Information about what the term Experimental Statistics means is published by the Office for National Statistics.
Additional data from HMRC’s Real Time Information system has been matched with CJRS data in order to produce the statistics released here.
Coverage
This publication covers all CJRS claims made by employers from the start of the scheme up to 31 October 2020 for support for the wages of furloughed staff up to 30 September 2020.
Upcoming changes
Future bulletins are planned to include additional statistics. The further analysis will be informed by user feedback. Please email CJRS.Statistics.Enquiries@hmrc.gov.uk. if you would like to offer feedback on how the contents can be improved in the future.
Methodology
This section provides notes on the methodology and implications for interpreting the figures.
The statistics in this release count employments. Therefore (for example), an employee with jobs at two employers will be counted twice if both jobs are furloughed.
The eligible population, used to calculate take-up figures and the breakdown by employer size, is based on a list of employees employed on 19 March 2020 and included in PAYE Real Time Information submissions for the 2019 to 2020 tax year.
Only employments in RTI submissions received by HMRC by 19 March 2020 are counted. Following the criteria for qualifying for the scheme, this is supplemented by a list of people who were employed on 28 February 2020 but who left their job before 19 March and who were later re-employed by the same employer.
In some circumstances HMRC holds incomplete information about employments, for example where a leaving date had not been submitted by employer. In this situation, an estimate of the probability that an individual was employed on the qualifying dates has been used. The assessment of whether a person was employed on the qualifying dates is based on the methodology used for the joint HMRC/ONS statistics release, Earnings and employment from Pay As You Earn Real Time Information, last released in November 2020.
Employers making claims for 100 or more employees at a time are required to submit the details of the employees furloughed in a spreadsheet-type file. While these claims have been processed from a customer service perspective, the processing of this information for these statistics has been complex and the processing of data on some employments has not been completed.
This is a factor behind the unknown category in the tables. The completeness of this data has gradually improved since the first release, and we expect some further (smaller) improvements.
The geographic and flexible furlough breakdowns of employments include all employees that employers have furloughed where it has been possible to link claim data on furloughed employments to classifying information (such as the employee’s gender and address).
The linking has been performed using employees’ National Insurance numbers to data held within HMRC’s Pay As You Earn (PAYE) Real Time Information (RTI) system. When the employer-submitted National Insurance numbers are not of sufficient quality to be matched with other HMRC data, the employments have been categorised as ‘unknown’.
The geographic breakdowns in the tables and maps use a postcode lookup file from Office for National Statistics (ONS) data to link UK postcodes to geographic areas.
Industrial sector information is based on the Interdepartmental Business Register (IDBR) produced by the ONS. Where PAYE schemes are absent from the IDBR, we have used sector information from Companies House, linking on employer name where possible.
This provides Standard Industrial Classification codes (UK SIC 2007) for employers that have made a claim. Where we have unable to determine SIC codes, we have reported the sector as ‘unknown’.
The time series in this bulletin show figures for the number of employments furloughed each day, using all claims submitted to HMRC by 31 October 2020. The closing date for claims for periods to the end of June was 31 July but schemes may submit claims for July onwards until 30 November.
Whilst we have been able to produce time series up to the end of September, at the time of the preparation of this bulletin, the data available for October was too incomplete to produce reliable statistics for this release.
The next release of these statistics will include final statistics for the CJRS up to the end of October.
In producing the time series statistics some challenges had to be tackled. These included dealing with data on amendments to claims and claims for overlapping periods. In addition, claims for 100 or more furloughed staff may include staff furloughed for varying periods.
These factors combined with some incomplete data (as mentioned above) make counting the number of employees furloughed over time complex. The method employed is designed to generally prevent overcounting employments and may in certain circumstances very slightly undercount.
Consequently, for the period to the end of June, the time series presented in this bulletin may typically slightly undercount the number of furloughed employments.
Some additional detail about the start and end dates of furlough periods is available from the job level data supplied with larger claims (covering 100 or more furloughed jobs). Previously it has not been possible to make use of this information but for this release, for the figures for July onwards, this additional information has been incorporated into the estimates.
The data for earlier periods is more affected by the issues of amendments and overlapping claims mentioned above, and the additional complexity that creates means that it has not be possible to apply this improvement to the earlier months at this stage. This improvement slightly reduces the size of the step changes in the series seen between July and August and apparent in the charts.
We are continuing to investigate possible refinements to further address the points above and may revise the figures in a later issue if appropriate.
From 1 July onwards, the claims data is incomplete. This series is therefore preliminary. Once we receive and incorporate all claims, we estimate the total number of people furloughed at the end of September will approximately 12% higher. This excludes the effect of any other refinements to the methodology that we may make.
We welcome questions and feedback. Our email address is: cjrs.statistics.enquiries@hmrc.gov.uk
Strengths and limitations
HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) grants pre-release access to Official Statistics publications, and in accordance with the HMRC policy, pre-release access has been granted to a number of people to enable the preparation of a ministerial briefing. Further details, including a list of those granted access, can be found on HMRC’s website.
Experimental Statistics status
The release is classed as Experimental Statistics as the methodologies used to produce the statistics are still in their development phase. This does not mean that the statistics are of low quality, but it does signify that the statistics are new and still being developed. As the methodologies are refined and improved, there may be revisions to these statistics.
Rather than waiting until the development work has been completed, the statistics are being published now to involve potential users in developing the statistics. We hope that this encourages users to provide us with their thoughts and suggestions of how useful the statistics are and what can be done to improve them. Comments can be sent by email to CJRS.Statistics.Enquiries@hmrc.gov.uk.
More information about what it means for Official Statistics to be classified as Experimental Statistics is available from the Office for Statistics Regulation.
Office for Statistics regulation review
These statistics have been produced quickly in response to developing world events. The Office for Statistics Regulation, on behalf of the UK Statistics Authority, has reviewed them against several key aspects of the Code of Practice for Statistics and regards them as consistent with the Code’s pillars of Trustworthiness, Quality and Value.
Strengths of the data
The data used in this release includes all claims made by employers up until 30 September 2020 and thus covers the complete employer population having made at least one CJRS claim. We have linked CJRS data to Pay As You Earn Real Time Information data (PAYE RTI) to provide the additional information presented in this release.
Revisions
The figures in this release incorporate data on claims received by HMRC up to 31 October and cover employments furloughed up to 30 September 2020. The figures presented for July onwards will be revised to reflect additional claims for July, August and September by the filing deadline for claims which is 30 November.
In future iterations of this statistics release there may be some further revisions reflecting improvements to the data processing and methodology.
Related links
Earnings and employment from Pay As You Earn Real Time Information, UK: November 2020 - Employee and earnings statistics from PAYE Real Time Information.
Labour market in the regions of the UK: November 2020 - Regional breakdowns of changes in UK employment, unemployment and economic activity
Employment in the UK: November 2020 - Estimates of employment, unemployment and economic inactivity for the UK.
Average weekly earnings in Great Britain: November 2020 - Estimates of growth in earnings for employees before tax and other deductions from pay.
HMRC coronavirus (COVID-19) statistics - Collection of HMRC data regarding COVID-19 response initiatives and policy.