Official Statistics

Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme statistics: March 2021

Published 25 March 2021

Overview

The Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (CJRS) was announced on 20 March 2020 and has supported employers in paying their employees during the COVID-19 pandemic.

This is the tenth release of Official Statistics on the CJRS. This release provides analysis of claims for periods up to 28 February 2021. The data used includes claims submitted to HMRC by 15 March 2021.

The data for February is not yet fully complete as while claims relating to February should have been filed by 15 March 2021, employers could file claims later with the agreement of HMRC if they had a reasonable excuse. Claims for February can also be amended until 29 March 2021. Together these factors are likely to have a small effect on the statistics.

Based on figures for January, it is estimated that the number of employments furloughed reported for February could increase by around 4%. The February figures should therefore be considered as provisional and will be revised in a future release.

This release also presents the cumulative number of jobs furloughed since the start of the scheme in March 2020 up to 15 March 2021. It also includes figures for the cumulative number of PAYE schemes that have claimed under the Job Retention Scheme and the total amount claimed. This replaces the previously published management information figures. In addition, this release includes new tables with cumulative figures by local authority and parliamentary constituency.

This release presents breakdowns at 31 January and 28 February 2021, including new tables at the 3-digit SIC 2007 level and a breakdown of furloughing for local authority by broad industry sector.

We will continue to publish statistics on the Job Retention Scheme and the CJRS extension in future months. These statistics are Experimental Statistics and are subject to revisions. Further information on the CJRS, the compilation of these statistics and the meaning of the term Experimental Statistics is provided later in this publication.

See guidance on applying for support from the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme and further details.

Contact details

For queries or feedback on this publication, please contact:

• Claire Breeze

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 6 May 2021.

Main points

The key points from this release covering the period to 28 February 2021 are below. Figures for February 2021 are provisional and subject to revision as additional claims for the period are received. Broadly, the age, gender and regional patterns of furloughed employments in February, and the business size breakdown of employers, are similar to those seen in January.

• the number of employments furloughed grew sharply in November and stood at 4.0 million at 31 December. The employments furloughed increased further in January to 4.9 million employments furloughed on 31 January (revised figure following late claims and amendments)
• provisional figures for February are slightly lower at 4.7 million furloughed at 28 February, but final levels are expected to be broadly similar to January once all claims and amendments for February have been received
• the levels of furloughing seen in these figures reflects the changes to restrictions on individuals, households and businesses across the UK since the autumn
• provisional figures show that all sectors have seen a slight reduction in levels of furlough between 31 January and 28 February. Once all claims and amendments for February have been received it is expected that we will see broad consistency in the levels of furlough for all sectors across the two months. The other service activities sector is an exception to this, which saw a slight increase in furloughing between 31 January and provisional figures for 28 February
• at 31 January, 41% of employers had staff furloughed. Provisional estimates show that this remained the same at 28 February. 16% of employments eligible for furlough were furloughed at 31 January. Provisional estimates show this remained broadly consistent at 15% at 28 February, but final figures are expected to show a take-up rate of 16% when all claims and amendments for February have been received
• since the start of the scheme a cumulative total of 11.4 million jobs have been supported by the CJRS at various times. This is across all claims submitted to 15 March 2021
• the accommodation and food services sector had the highest take-up rate at 31 January at 68% of eligible employers furloughing and provisional estimates show this increased to 69% of employers at 28 February. 1.23 million employments were furloughed in this sector on 31 January. Provisional estimates show the number of employments furloughed decreased to 1.15 million on 28 February
• furloughing of staff in the wholesale and retail sector peaked on 24 April at 1.85 million employments furloughed. This dropped to 356,400 employments furloughed at 31 October. The number of employments furloughed increased throughout November, December and January to 985,100 at 31 January. Provisional figures show that at 28 February, furloughing in this sector had decreased to 918,500 employments furloughed
• this publication includes a more detailed breakdown of furlough rates by 3-digit SIC 2007
• the beverage serving activities sector had the highest proportion of eligible employments furloughed at 31 January, with a take-up rate of 86%. This was followed by the hotels and similar accommodation sector which had 79% of its eligible employments furloughed. Provisional figures for 28 February show these sectors had employment take-up rates of 78% and 69% respectively, the largest take-up rates of all sectors
• the restaurants and mobile food service activities had the highest number of employments furloughed at 31 January with 466,400 employments furloughed. Provisional figures show this sector had 444,100 employments furloughed at 28 February
• in the passenger air transport sector, there were 200 employers (61% of employers eligible) furloughing 35,100 employments (52% of eligible employments) at 31 January. At 28 February, provisional figures show this remained similar with 35,300 employments furloughed
• overall, medium and large sized employers had a lower proportion of their employees furloughed under the CJRS than small and micro-sized employers in January and February
• provisional figures for 28 February show that employers with 250 or more employees had 9% of eligible employees furloughed compared with 15% across all employers. Employers with 2 to 4 employees had the highest proportion of eligible employees furloughed at 35%
• across the UK, where it was possible to link the data, 2.40 million females were furloughed at 31 January compared with 2.24 million males. Provisional estimates show a broadly similar pattern with 2.34 million females furloughed at 28 February and 2.14 million males
• provisional figures for the end of February showed that London had the highest furlough take-up rate at 17% of jobs where the employee was resident in London furloughed against a UK average of 15%. London also had the highest take-up in January
• the under 18 age band had the highest take up rate for both females and males at 31 January, 40% and 30% respectively. Provisional estimates for 28 February show that the under 18 age band continued to have the highest take-up rates at 39% for females and 28% for males
• employees aged 18 to 24 and 65 and over were more likely than average to be furloughed while levels of furloughing were lowest among employees aged 50 to 54
• 1.37 million employments were on partial furlough at 31 January, 28% of the total employments furloughed. Provisional estimates show this figure decreased to 1.27 million employments furloughed at 28 February, 27% of the total employments furloughed

About the data in this release

The data used in this release comprises the CJRS claims made up to 15 March 2021. 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 figures for the use of the CJRS 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 flexibly (or partially) furloughed)

Updated and new tables:

• figures for the use of CJRS extension as at 31 January 2020 and provisional figures for the use of CJRS extension as at 28 February 2021, by the following categories:
  • 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
  • a detailed sector breakdown at 3-digit SIC 2007 level
  • local authority and sector

These statistics have been developed taking into account user feedback and requests. We would welcome any further feedback from users. This should be sent to CJRS.Statistics.Enquiries@hmrc.gov.uk. 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.

An individual employed by more than one employer is counted once for each employment furloughed. Two individuals who have been employed in the same role with an employer at different times are counted as two separate employments. In this release the terms ‘employments’ and ‘jobs’ are used interchangeably.

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.

This 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.

When the CJRS extension was introduced on 1 November 2020, it again became possible to claim support for furloughing jobs that had not been previously furloughed. The criteria for eligibility for the CJRS were amended for the CJRS extension.

For furloughing from November 2020 onwards, the numbers of jobs presented as ‘eligible employments’ and used to calculate take-up figures reflect the criteria for eligibility for the CJRS extension. They are based on a list of employees employed on 30 October 2020 and included in PAYE Real Time Information submissions for 20 March 2020 to 30 October 2020.

The figures for February 2021 are based on claims received to the deadline of 15 March 2021. In some circumstances, late claims can be made with a reasonable excuse and in agreement with HMRC. Claims may also be amended until 29 March 2021. Therefore, the data for February 2021 is incomplete and should be considered to be provisional.

It is estimated that the overall total number of employments furloughed in February will be in the region of 4% higher once all claims are submitted and revisions applied.

Except for the figures in the next section (titled: Cumulative claims and jobs furloughed since the start of the CJRS), the data in this release shows the total number of employments furloughed each day from March 2020 to February 2021.

The first three releases of these statistics, published in June, July and August 2020, reported estimates of the total number of jobs that had been furloughed at any time over the March to June period, based on the latest data available at the time of those releases. With the introduction of flexible furlough on 1 July, this statistical release series began reporting estimates of the number of jobs furloughed each day, with additional breakdowns for the last day in each month.

The data presented in this release comes from combining details about furloughing from the job level data and the total number of furloughed staff included in each claim.

Cumulative claims and jobs furloughed since the start of the CJRS

This section of the release presents the cumulative number of jobs furloughed since the start of the scheme in March 2020 up to 15 March 2021. It also includes figures for the cumulative number of PAYE schemes that have claimed under the Job Retention Scheme and the total amount claimed.

Table 1 shows that there have been 11.4 million unique jobs supported by the CJRS since its inception. This is a cumulative figure and covers all jobs furloughed at any time since the start of the scheme.

As described in detail in the methodology section of this release, the methodology used to calculate this figure has been improved and now uses job-level data rather than totals from claim forms submitted by employers. As a result, the figure is not directly comparable with the previously published management information figures.

This methodology change does not affect published figures on the number of jobs furloughed at the end of each month, or the more detailed statistics on the number of jobs furloughed each day.

An individual employed by more than one employer is counted once for each employment furloughed. Two individuals who have been employed in the same role with an employer at different times are counted as two separate employments. In this release the terms ‘employments’ and ‘jobs’ are used interchangeably.

The figures in table 1 are based on claims received up to 15 March 2021, the deadline for claims relating to February 2021. As well as claims made for February and earlier, these figures include claims for employments furloughed after February 2021 where the claim was received by 15 March 2021.

Table 1 also includes the total number of employer PAYE schemes that had claimed support up to 15 March 2021 and the value of claims submitted.

All these figures together with the figures previously published as management information on the main HMRC COVID-19 statistics page can be found in table 1 of the spreadsheet that accompanies this release.

Figures on the cumulative number of jobs furloughed broken down by local authority and Parliamentary constituency can also be found in tables 1a and 1b of the spreadsheet that accompanies this release.

Table 1: Cumulative claims and jobs furloughed since the start of the CJRS

Date	Cumulative number of jobs furloughed (million)	Cumulative number of employers (million)	Cumulative amount claimed (£ billion)
At 15 February 2021	11.2	1.3	53.8
At 15 March 2021	11.4	1.3	57.7

Source: HMRC CJRS data

Employments furloughed over time

This section of the release presents the number of employments furloughed each day from the scheme’s start up to 28 February 2021. The chart in figure 1 shows the number of jobs furloughed under claims for support to the CJRS. The underlying data for this figure can be found in the accompanying spreadsheet.

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 until the end of October, falling from 6.8 million at 30 June to 2.4 million at 31 October
• the number of employments furloughed increased on 1 November to 3.7 million, this figure continued to rise throughout November to 3.9 million on 30 November, corresponding to increased restrictions on individuals, households and businesses seen across the UK in the autumn
• the number of employments furloughed remained steady throughout December, with 4.0 million employments furloughed at 31 December
• latest figures show the employments furloughed increased in January to 4.9 million employments furloughed on 31 January, coinciding with tighter restrictions on business opening that were introduced on 6 January
• provisional figures for February are slightly lower at 4.7 million furloughed at 28 February, but final levels are expected to be broadly similar across January and February once all claims and amendments for February have been received

Figure 1: Total employments furloughed, 23 March 2020 to 28 February 2021

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 of 15 industrial sectors experiencing higher numbers of jobs furloughed. The underlying data for this figure and 6 other sector categories not shown in the chart can be found in the accompanying spreadsheet.

The key points to note from figure 2 are:

• following on from the latest release which covered the period to 31 January, provisional figures show that all sectors have seen a slight reduction in levels of furlough between 31 January and 28 February. Once all claims and amendments for February have been received it is expected that we will see broad consistency in the levels of furlough for all sectors
• the other service activities sector is an exception to this, which saw a slight increase in furloughing between 31 January and provisional figures for 28 February
• furloughing of staff in the wholesale and retail sector peaked on 24 April at 1.85 million employments furloughed. This dropped to 356,400 employments furloughed at 31 October. The number of employments furloughed increased throughout November, December and January to 985,100 at 31 January. Provisional figures show that at 28 February, furloughing in this sector had decreased to 918,500 employments furloughed
• accommodation and food services peaked at 1.65 million employments furloughed on 10 April, this fell to 1.23 million employments furloughed at 31 January. Provisional figures show that the number of employments furloughed decreased through February to 1.15 million at 28 February
• the manufacturing sector had a peak of 911,000 employments furloughed on 17 April. This declined to 188,200 at 31 October. Through November, December and January the number of employments furloughed increased to 317,500 at 31 January. Provisional estimates show that this figure dropped to 294,800 at 28 February
• in construction, furloughing peaked on 14 April with 723,600 employments furloughed, this fell to 169,700 at 30 November. This figure increased through December and January to 245,700 employments furloughed at 31 January. Provisional estimates show that at the end of February the number of employments furloughed had decreased to 229,200
• furloughing in the arts and entertainment sector peaked later than other sectors on 15 May with 455,100 employments furloughed on that date. By 31 October this had dropped to 159,600 employments furloughed. Through November, December and January this figure increased to 317,700 employments furloughed at 31 January. Provisional figures show that this figure remained broadly similar with 313,400 employments furloughed at 28 February

Figure 2: Total employments furloughed by industry (millions) (largest 15 sectors), 23 March 2020 to 28 February 2021

Source: HMRC CJRS and PAYE Real Time Information data

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 the 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 most employer sizes, the number of employments furloughed increased in January and then remained broadly constant in February
• at 31 December, 1.24 million employments were furloughed by large employers with 250 or more employees. This increased to 1.64 million at 31 January. Provisional estimates show that the number of employments furloughed decreased to 1.50 million at 28 February
• employers with 20 to 49 employments had 559,800 employments furloughed on 31 December. This figure increased to 658,200 at 31 January. Provisional estimates show that the number of employments furloughed remained similar at 634,800 at 28 February
• employers with one employment had 172,000 employments furloughed at 31 December. The employments furloughed then increased through January, dropping slightly at the end of the month to 195,000 at 31 January. Provisional figures show that this remained broadly constant at 191,100 at 28 February

Figure 3: Total employments furloughed (millions) by employer size (number of employees), 23 March 2020 to 28 February 2021

Source: HMRC CJRS and PAYE Real Time Information data

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 2020 up to 28 February 2021. 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). Figures for February should be considered to be provisional.

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:

• across all English regions, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland the number of employments furloughed increased from 31 December to 31 January. Provisional figures show that furloughing then remained similar through February
• 1.90 million employments were furloughed in England at 31 October. This figure increased through to 2021 with 3.89 million employments furloughed at 31 January. Provisional estimates show that the number of employments furloughed was consistent in February with 3.75 million at 28 February
• in London – the English region with the most furloughed staff from July 2020 to February 2021, there were 644,400 employments furloughed at 30 November. This increased to 654,100 employments furloughed at 31 December and 735,600 employments furloughed at 31 January. Provisional estimates show similar levels of furloughing in February with 710,800 employments furloughed at 28 February
• the number of employments furloughed in Scotland on 30 November was 228,300. This figure increased to 288,900 employments furloughed at 31 December and 373,000 employments furloughed at 31 January. Provisional figures show a broad consistency in the number of employments furloughed to 364,100 at 28 February
• the number of employments furloughed in Wales was 125,000 at 30 November. This increased to 158,700 employments furloughed at 31 December and increased further to 183,400 employments furloughed at 31 January. Provisional estimates show the number of employments furloughed was similar in February with 175,200 at 28 February
• on 30 November, the number of furloughed employments in Northern Ireland was 79,300. This increased to 96,500 employments furloughed at 31 December and 109,000 employments furloughed at 31 January. Provisional figures show that the number of employments furloughed remained consistent through February to 106,500 at 28 February

Figure 4: Total employments furloughed (millions) by country and region, 1 July 2020 to 28 February 2021

Source: HMRC CJRS and PAYE Real Time Information data

Employments furloughed over time by gender

This section provides analysis showing the number of employments furloughed each day from 1 July 2020 up to 28 February 2021, 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, there were 1.19 million employments furloughed at 31 October. This increased to 1.92 million employments furloughed at 31 December and then increased further to 2.40 million employments furloughed at 31 January. Provisional figures show that this number remained broadly consistent throughout February to 2.34 million at 28 February
• for employments where the employee was male, there were 1.14 million at 31 October. At 30 November this had increased to 1.79 million and continued to increase through December to 1.88 million employments furloughed at 31 December
• after increasing further in January to 2.24 million employments at 31 January, provisional figures show that this was similar in February with 2.14 million employments furloughed at 28 February

Figure 5: Total employments furloughed by gender, 1 July 2020 to 28 February 2021

Source: HMRC CJRS and PAYE Real Time Information data

Employments furloughed over time by age

This section provides analysis for the number of employments furloughed each day from 1 July 2020 up to 28 February 2021, broken down by age band. The claimant’s age is calculated at 1 March 2020 for employments furloughed up to 31 October, and at 1 November 2020 for employments furloughed from 1 November onwards.

Figure 6 is a set of charts, one for each age band. 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:

• across all age bands the number of employments furloughed increased between 31 December and 31 January and then remained broadly similar through February
• for employments where the employee was aged 25 to 34, the number of employments was 526,000 on 31 October, the highest across all age bands. This increased to 865,800 at 30 November, 887,900 at 31 December and 1.06 million at 31 January. Provisional figures show that this figure was similar at 1.02 million at 28 February
• the number of employments furloughed with employees in the 18 to 24 age band was 325,300 on 31 October. This increased to 641,300 on 30 November, 651,000 on 31 December and 770,400 at 31 January. At 28 February, provisional figures show that 719,300 employments were furloughed in the 18-24 age band
• where the employee was 65 or over, the number of employments furloughed was 111,900 at 31 October. At 30 November, the number of employments furloughed had risen to 156,200 before a small decline to 153,200 at 31 December. This then increased again to 186,200 employments furloughed at 31 January. Provisional estimates show that the number of employments remained broadly constant in February to 184,600 at 28 February

Figure 6: Total employments furloughed (millions) by age of employee, 1 July 2020 to 28 February 2021

Source: HMRC CJRS and PAYE Real Time Information data

Employments furloughed over time by furlough type

This section provides a breakdown of the overall time series by employments furloughed fully and partially. 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.

The key points to note in figure 7 are:

• the number of employments furloughed on a full-time basis decreased month on month from July to 31 October, where it stood at 1.36 million. The number of employments fully furloughed then increased through November to 2.36 million at 30 November before a slight decline to 2.33 million employments furloughed at 31 December
• this increased again in January with 3.29 million employments fully furloughed at 31 January and provisional figures show that this was similar in February with 3.23 million employments fully furloughed at 28 February
• the number of employments claimed for while the employee was working some of their usual hours has remained steady between when this was made possible on 1 July and October. At 31 October there were 977,200 employments flexibly furloughed. This increased to 1.37 million at 30 November and 1.48 million at 31 December
• the number of employments flexibly furloughed decreased to 1.37 million at 31 January, with provisional figures showing a further decrease to 1.27 million at 28 February
• this means that a lower proportion of jobs were partially furloughed in January and February 2021 than in November and December 2020, which is consistent with the greater restrictions on business activity in place during January and February

Figure 7: Total employments furloughed by furlough type, 1 July 2020 to 28 February 2021

Source: HMRC CJRS data

Furloughing by Employer Size at 31 January and provisional figures for 28 February

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 2a and 2b are:

• at 31 January, 41% of employers had staff furloughed. Provisional estimates show that this remained the same at 28 February
• as at 31 January, employers with 20-49 employees were most likely to have claimed under CJRS to support the furloughing of staff, with 61% of employers of this size having at least 1 employee furloughed. Provisional estimates show this was still true at 28 February with 62% of these employers having staff furloughed
• the figures for the value of claims do not take account of voluntary repayments

Table 2a: CJRS claims by employer size as at 31 January 2021 – employer level

Employer size	Employers furloughing staff	Take-up rateǂ	Value of claims made for periods from 1 November to 31 January (£ million)
1	195,000	27%	415
2 to 4	315,000	45%	1,391
5 to 9	136,400	53%	1,259
10 to 19	75,100	54%	1,212
20 to 49	53,600	61%	1,508
50 to 99	15,700	55%	720
100 to 249	9,500	57%	713
250+	6,400	56%	2,915
Unknown	400	-	3
Total	807,200	41%	10,137

Table 2b: CJRS claims by employer size as at 28 February 2021 (provisional) – employer level

Employer size	Employers furloughing staff	Take-up rateǂ	Value of claims made for periods from 1 November 2020 to 28 February 2021 (£ million)
1	191,100	27%	562
2 to 4	313,400	45%	1,894
5 to 9	136,600	53%	1,723
10 to 19	75,600	54%	1,663
20 to 49	54,000	62%	2,074
50 to 99	15,800	56%	999
100 to 249	9,600	58%	1,002
250+	6,400	57%	4,110
Unknown	600	-	8
Total	803,200	41%	14,035

ǂ The take up rates are based on employments eligible for the CJRS extension.

Source: HMRC CJRS and PAYE Real Time Information data

The key points to note from tables 2c and 2d are:

• 16% of employments eligible for furlough were furloughed at 31 January. Provisional estimates show this remained broadly consistent at 15% at 28 February
• employers with 250 or more employees had a total of 1.64 million employments furloughed at 31 January, the highest of all employer sizes. Provisional estimates show this figure decreased by 146,400 to 1.50 million at 28 February, the highest of any employer size in February
• medium and large sized employers have the lowest take up rates. Provisional figures for 28 February show that employers with 250 or more employees have 9% of eligible employees furloughed in comparison with the average 15%. Employers with 2 to 4 employees had the highest proportion of eligible employees furloughed at 35%

Table 2c: CJRS claims by employer size as at 31 January 2021 – employment level

Employer size	Employments furloughed	Eligible employmentsǂ	Take-up rateǂ
1	195,000	719,900	27%
2 to 4	624,600	1,735,400	36%
5 to 9	543,800	1,613,500	34%
10 to 19	526,000	1,823,700	29%
20 to 49	658,200	2,598,500	25%
50 to 99	331,800	1,920,900	17%
100 to 249	357,000	2,521,300	14%
250+	1,644,200	17,242,600	10%
Unknown	2,800	-	-
Total	4,883,500	30,175,900	16%

Table 2d: CJRS claims by employer size as at 28 February 2021 (provisional) – employment level

Employer size	Employments furloughed	Eligible employmentsǂ	Take-up rateǂ
1	191,100	719,900	27%
2 to 4	615,200	1,735,400	35%
5 to 9	534,300	1,613,500	33%
10 to 19	515,800	1,823,700	28%
20 to 49	634,800	2,598,500	24%
50 to 99	316,400	1,920,900	16%
100 to 249	338,800	2,521,300	13%
250+	1,497,800	17,242,600	9%
Unknown	6,000	-	-
Total	4,650,200	30,175,900	15%

ǂ The take up rates are based on employments eligible for the CJRS extension.

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 tables 2a and 2c.

Furloughing by Sector at 31 January and provisional figures for 28 February

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 3a, 3b, 3c and 3d, below.

Key points from tables 3a and 3b are:

• the accommodation and food services sector had the highest take-up rate at 31 January at 68% of eligible employers furloughing and provisional estimates show this increased to 69% of employers at 28 February
• the arts, entertainment and recreation and other service activities sectors had the second highest take-up rates at 64%. This remained constant for the arts, entertainment and recreation sector to 28 February, but increased to 65% for the other service activities sector
• at 131,100 the wholesale and retail sector had the largest number of employers furloughing staff at 31 January. Provisional figures for February show that this continued to be true with 131,000 employers furloughing staff in this sector at 28 February
• at 28 February, the accommodation and food service sector had the highest value of claims at £3.45 billion

Table 3a: CJRS claims by sector as at 31 January 2021 – employer level

Sector	Employers furloughing staff	Take-up rateǂ	Value of claims made for periods from 1 November to 31 January (£ million)
Agriculture, forestry and fishing	5,800	17%	38
Mining and quarrying	300	31%	6
Manufacturing	49,500	49%	708
Energy production and supply	400	33%	9
Water supply, sewerage and waste	2,600	46%	35
Construction	94,400	39%	597
Wholesale and retail; repair of motor vehicles	131,100	53%	1,851
Transportation and storage	30,500	40%	528
Accommodation and food services	90,800	68%	2,554
Information and communication	39,300	27%	294
Finance and insurance	9,300	27%	77
Real estate	20,600	43%	154
Professional, scientific and technical	102,800	33%	663
Administrative and support services	72,200	44%	869
Public administration and defence; social security	300	5%	13
Education	19,300	49%	235
Health and social work	35,300	35%	288
Arts, entertainment and recreation	26,300	64%	653
Other service activities	59,400	64%	448
Households	2,600	3%	7
Unknown and other	14,000	-	109
Total	807,200	41%	10,137

Table 3b: CJRS claims by sector as at 28 February 2021 (provisional) – employer level

Sector	Employers furloughing staff	Take-up rateǂ	Value of claims made for periods from 1 November 2020 to 28 February 2021 (£ million)
Agriculture, forestry and fishing	5,800	17%	54
Mining and quarrying	300	31%	8
Manufacturing	49,200	49%	971
Energy production and supply	400	33%	13
Water supply, sewerage and waste	2,600	45%	49
Construction	91,100	38%	824
Wholesale and retail; repair of motor vehicles	131,000	53%	2,624
Transportation and storage	30,700	40%	738
Accommodation and food services	91,700	69%	3,449
Information and communication	38,600	26%	395
Finance and insurance	9,300	27%	105
Real estate	20,400	43%	212
Professional, scientific and technical	101,700	33%	898
Administrative and support services	71,900	44%	1,194
Public administration and defence; social security	400	5%	19
Education	19,300	49%	369
Health and social work	35,300	35%	412
Arts, entertainment and recreation	26,300	64%	906
Other service activities	60,400	65%	626
Households	2,500	3%	10
Unknown and other	14,300	-	157
Total	803,200	41%	14,035

ǂ The take up rates are based on employments eligible for the CJRS extension.

Source: HMRC CJRS and PAYE Real Time Information data and Inter-Departmental Business Register

Key points from tables 3c and 3d are:

• at 31 January, the sector with the highest proportion of its workforce eligible for furlough that were furloughed was the accommodation and food services sector at 61% followed by arts, entertainment and recreation at 55%
• take-up rates across all sectors remained similar when comparing figures for 31 January with provisional estimates for 28 February
• at 88,800, the accommodation and food services sector had the largest decrease when comparing the number of employments furloughed at 31 January to provisional figures for 28 February
• the other service activities sector was the only sector to see an increase in the number of employments furloughed between 31 January and 28 February, with the number of employments furloughed increasing from 223,800 to 224,800

Table 3c: CJRS claims by sector as at 31 January 2021 – employment level

Sector	Employments furloughed	Take-up rateǂ
Agriculture, forestry and fishing	21,400	10%
Mining and quarrying	2,100	4%
Manufacturing	317,500	13%
Energy production and supply	3,100	2%
Water supply, sewerage and waste	14,300	8%
Construction	245,700	19%
Wholesale and retail; repair of motor vehicles	985,100	22%
Transportation and storage	192,700	14%
Accommodation and food services	1,234,400	61%
Information and communication	111,500	9%
Finance and insurance	32,100	3%
Real estate	65,500	15%
Professional, scientific and technical	272,300	12%
Administrative and support services	401,000	15%
Public administration and defence; social security	9,800	1%
Education	192,700	6%
Health and social work	185,500	4%
Arts, entertainment and recreation	317,700	55%
Other service activities	223,800	41%
Households	3,400	3%
Unknown and other	51,800	-
Total	4,883,500	16%

Table 3d: CJRS claims by sector as at 28 February 2021 (provisional) – employment level

Sector	Employments furloughed	Take-up rateǂ
Agriculture, forestry and fishing	20,300	10%
Mining and quarrying	2,000	4%
Manufacturing	294,800	12%
Energy production and supply	3,000	2%
Water supply, sewerage and waste	13,300	8%
Construction	229,200	18%
Wholesale and retail; repair of motor vehicles	918,500	20%
Transportation and storage	192,200	14%
Accommodation and food services	1,145,600	56%
Information and communication	108,000	9%
Finance and insurance	30,800	3%
Real estate	63,700	15%
Professional, scientific and technical	266,500	12%
Administrative and support services	383,200	14%
Public administration and defence; social security	9,700	1%
Education	191,100	6%
Health and social work	181,700	4%
Arts, entertainment and recreation	313,400	55%
Other service activities	224,800	41%
Households	3,300	2%
Unknown and other	55,200	-
Total	4,650,200	15%

ǂ The take up rates are based on employments eligible for the CJRS extension.

Source: HMRC CJRS and PAYE Real Time Information data and Inter-Departmental Business Register

Furloughing by Countries and Regions at 31 January and provisional figures for 28 February, 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.

Figures 8a and 8b show 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 figures 8a and 8b are:

• London and the South East accounted for 1.39 million of the furloughed employments at 31 January. Provisional estimates show this was similar in February when they accounted for 1.34 million of the furloughed employments at 28 February
• the East Midlands and West Midlands had a total of 688,600 employments furloughed at 31 January, remaining broadly consistent in February with 661,300 at 28 February
• at 31 January, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland combined had 665,400 employments claimed for under CJRS. Provisional estimates for 28 February show a slight decrease of 19,600 to 645,700 employments furloughed
• across the UK, where it was possible to link the data, 2.40 million females were furloughed at 31 January compared with 2.24 million males. Provisional estimates show that furloughing remained broadly similar with 2.34 million females furloughed at 28 February and 2.14 million males

Figure 8a: Employments furloughed as at 31 January 2021, by country and region and gender

Region	Female	Male	Total
London	362,900	372,700	735,600
South East	346,800	306,400	653,200
North West	248,200	241,400	489,600
East	229,900	200,300	430,300
West Midlands	195,700	184,600	380,300
South West	211,500	185,100	396,600
Yorkshire And The Humber	173,400	163,600	337,000
East Midlands	162,000	146,300	308,300
North East	81,300	74,700	156,000
Wales	95,300	88,100	183,400
Scotland	193,100	179,900	373,000
Northern Ireland	55,900	53,100	109,000

Figure 8b: Employments furloughed as at 28 February 2021 (provisional), by country and region and gender

Region	Female	Male	Total
London	349,900	360,900	710,800
South East	337,400	293,900	631,300
North West	241,000	228,900	469,900
East	225,000	193,300	418,300
West Midlands	189,400	173,300	362,700
South West	207,700	174,800	382,500
Yorkshire And The Humber	171,100	158,200	329,300
East Midlands	158,800	139,800	298,600
North East	79,700	70,500	150,100
Wales	93,100	82,100	175,200
Scotland	189,600	174,500	364,100
Northern Ireland	54,800	51,600	106,500

Source: HMRC CJRS data and PAYE Real Time Information

Figures 9a and 9b show the take-up rates of employments furloughed within each country and region using CJRS with a gender breakdown.

The key points to note from figures 9a and 9b are:

• there was broad consistency in furlough rates across the nations and regions of the UK at the end of January with London having the highest take-up rate of 18% against the UK average of 16%. Provisional estimates show that this was also true at the end of February with London having the highest take-up rate at 17% against a UK average of 15%
• as shown in figures 9a and 9b, the take up rate is similar for males and females within all regions and countries of the UK at 31 January and 28 February

Figure 9a: Employment furlough take-up rate at 31 January 2021, by country and region and gender

Region	Female	Male
London	18%	18%
South East	17%	15%
North West	15%	15%
East	16%	14%
West Midlands	15%	14%
South West	17%	15%
Yorkshire And The Humber	15%	14%
East Midlands	15%	13%
North East	14%	14%
Wales	14%	14%
Scotland	16%	15%
Northern Ireland	14%	14%

Figure 9b: Employment furlough take-up rate at 28 February 2021 (provisional), by country and region and gender

Region	Female	Male
London	17%	18%
South East	16%	14%
North West	15%	14%
East	16%	14%
West Midlands	15%	13%
South West	16%	14%
Yorkshire And The Humber	14%	13%
East Midlands	14%	13%
North East	14%	13%
Wales	14%	13%
Scotland	15%	15%
Northern Ireland	14%	14%

ǂ The take up rates are based on employments eligible for the CJRS extension.

Source: HMRC CJRS and PAYE Real Time Information data

The data for figures 8a, 8b, 9a and 9b can be accessed from the accompanying spreadsheet.

Furloughing by Local Authority and Parliamentary Constituency at 31 January and provisional figures for 28 February, 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.

Tables 12 and 13 in the accompanying spreadsheet additionally provide a gender breakdown that is not shown in the maps in this section.

In figures 10a and 10b we present maps representing the take-up rates for employments furloughed for local authorities at 31 January and 28 February (provisional figures). Darker shades indicate a higher take-up rate.

The key points to note for local authorities are:

• on 31 January, South Lakeland had the highest take-up rate at 26%. This was followed by Eden and Newham at 23%. Provisional estimates for 28 February show that this remained the same with South Lakeland having a take-up rate of 26% and Eden and Newham having take-up rates of 22%
• on 31 January the Shetland Islands has the lowest proportion of employments furloughed at 9%, with provisional estimates for 28 February showing that this remained to be the case
• Birmingham had the highest number of employments furloughed on 31 January at 70,500, a take-up rate of 16%. Provisional estimates for 28 February show that Birmingham continued to have the highest number of employments furloughed at 67,600, a take-up rate of 15%
• in Scotland, Highland, and Perth and Kinross had the highest take-up rates at 31 January at 19%. At 28 February, provisional estimates show that Highland alone had the highest take-up rate at 19%
• for Northern Ireland, Causeway Coast and Glens, and Newry, Mourne and Down had the highest take-up rates at 16% at both 31 January and 28 February (provisional estimates)
• in Wales, Conwy, Gwynedd and Pembrokeshire had the highest take-up rates at 19% at 31 January. Provisional estimates for 28 February show that Conwy had the highest take-up rate at 19%

Figure 10a: Employments furloughed as a proportion of eligible employments at 31 January 2021, by Local Authority

Figure 10b: Employments furloughed as a proportion of eligible employments at 28 February 2021 (provisional), by Local Authority

ǂ These maps are based on the number of employments eligible for the CJRS extension. (See methodology section for more information.)

Source: HMRC CJRS and PAYE Real Time Information data

In figures 11a and 11b we present maps representing provisional take-up rates for employments furloughed for UK Parliamentary Constituencies at 31 January and 28 February (provisional figures). Darker shades indicate a higher take-up rate.

The key points to note for UK Parliamentary Constituencies are:

• at 31 January and 28 February (provisional estimates), Westmorland and Lonsdale had the highest take-up rate at 28%
• the rate of furloughed employments was lowest in Orkney and Shetland constituency at 9% at both 31 January and 28 February (provisional estimates)
• West Ham constituency had the highest number of employments furloughed at 31 January, with 20,100 employments furloughed. Provisional estimates show this was true at 28 February also, with West Ham having 19,400 employments furloughed
• in Northern Ireland, Belfast North and East Londonderry constituencies had the highest take-up rates at 16%. Provisional estimates show that East Londonderry had the highest take-up rate of 16% at 28 February
• in Scotland, the Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey constituency had the highest take-up rate at 20%. Provisional figures show the Edinburgh East, Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey, and Ross, Skye and Lochaber constituencies had the highest take-up rates at 28 February at 19%
• in Wales, the Dwyfor Meirionnydd constituency had the highest take-rate at 31 January at 23%. Provisional figures for 28 February show the Aberconwy and Dwyfor Meirionnydd constituencies had the highest take-up rates at 22%

Figure 11a: Employments furloughed as a proportion of eligible employments at 31 January 2021, by Parliamentary Constituency

Figure 11b: Employments furloughed as a proportion of eligible employments at 28 February 2021 (provisional), by Parliamentary Constituency

ǂ These maps are based on the number of employments eligible for the CJRS extension. (See methodology section for more information.)

Source: HMRC CJRS and PAYE Real Time Information data

Furloughing by Age at 31 January and provisional figures for 28 February, including gender breakdown

This section of the release describes the number of employments furloughed as at 31 January by employees’ age and gender and provisional estimates as at 28 February. 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 November 2020.

The key points to note from figures 12a and 12b are:

• at 31 January the 18 to 24 age band had the highest number of claimants for both females and males, 425,300 and 345,100 respectively. Provisional estimates show that this was still true at 28 February with 398,500 females furloughed and 320,800 males
• figures for 31 January and provisional estimates for 28 February show that the under 18 age group had the lowest number of employments furloughed across both months, 115,000 employments at 31 January and 111,200 employments furloughed at 28 February

Figure 12a: Employments furloughed as at 31 January 2021, by age and gender of employee

Age band	Female	Male
Under 18	70,900	44,100
18 to 24	425,300	345,100
25 to 29	269,000	268,600
30 to 34	262,400	263,400
35 to 39	246,900	243,700
40 to 44	224,400	220,600
45 to 49	224,100	210,400
50 to 54	234,800	211,600
55 to 59	207,300	191,200
60 to 64	144,100	142,700
65 and over	88,000	98,200

Figure 12b: Employments furloughed as at 28 February 2021 (provisional), by age and gender of employee

Age band	Female	Male
Under 18	68,900	42,300
18 to 24	398,500	320,800
25 to 29	258,000	253,100
30 to 34	255,900	251,100
35 to 39	243,500	234,300
40 to 44	222,300	213,500
45 to 49	221,600	203,000
50 to 54	232,600	204,000
55 to 59	205,800	185,300
60 to 64	143,200	139,700
65 and over	87,700	96,900

Source: HMRC CJRS data and PAYE Real Time Information

Figures 13a and 13b show the take-up rate of employments furloughed broken down by age and gender.

The key points to note from figures 13a and 13b are:

• the under 18 age band had the highest take up rate for both female and males at 31 January, 40% and 30% respectively. Provisional estimates for 28 February show that the under 18 age band continued to have the highest take-up rates at 39% for females and 28% for males
• provisional estimates for 28 February show that take-up rates remained similar across all age bands from 31 January

Figure 13a: Employment furlough take-up rate at 31 January 2021, by age and gender of the employee

Age band	Female	Male
Under 18	40%	30%
18 to 24	24%	20%
25 to 29	15%	15%
30 to 34	15%	14%
35 to 39	15%	14%
40 to 44	14%	14%
45 to 49	14%	13%
50 to 54	14%	13%
55 to 59	14%	13%
60 to 64	15%	15%
65 and over	18%	18%

Figure 13b: Employment furlough take-up rate at 28 February 2021 (provisional), by age and gender of the employee

Age band	Female	Male
Under 18	39%	28%
18 to 24	22%	19%
25 to 29	15%	15%
30 to 34	14%	14%
35 to 39	14%	13%
40 to 44	14%	13%
45 to 49	13%	13%
50 to 54	13%	12%
55 to 59	14%	13%
60 to 64	15%	15%
65 and over	17%	17%

ǂ The take up rates are based on employments eligible for the CJRS extension.

Source: HMRC CJRS and PAYE Real Time Information data

Furloughing by Region and Sector at 31 January and provisional figures for 28 February

Tables 17 and 18 in the accompanying spreadsheet show the number of employments furloughed by local authority and region by sector at 31 January and provisional estimates at 28 February

The key points to note are:

• at 31 January, across all countries and regions except for Northern Ireland, the accommodation and food services sector had the highest number of employments furloughed, followed by the wholesale and retail sector. In Northern Ireland the wholesale and retail sector had the highest number of employments furloughed at 31 January, followed by accommodation and food services
• provisional estimates for 28 February show the accommodation and food service sector had the highest number of employments furloughed in all local authorities except for West Midlands where the wholesale and retail sector overtook the accommodation and food services sector
• in London, 26% of the employments furloughed were in the accommodation and food services sector on 31 January. Provisional estimates show this was similar in February at 25% at 28 February
• Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland combined had 164,400 employments furloughed in the accommodation and food services sector at 31 January. Provisional estimates show this remained broadly consistent at 158,300 at 28 February

Background

The government announced the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (CJRS) on 20 March 2020. It was introduced 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 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.

Up to date information about the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme can be found online. The pages on applying for support, for example, include further details of the eligibility criteria. Older versions of the guidance can be found in the National Archive by following the links from the guidance pages.

Changes to the scheme from 1 July 2020

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).

From 1 July 2020, employers have had 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 need to report and claim for a minimum period of a week. Employers had until 30 November 2020 to submit claims for support from the CJRS.

Changes to the scheme from 1 November 2020

The CJRS scheme was extended from 1 November 2020. The rules for an employment to qualify to be covered by the extended scheme are set out in guidance.

The two key rules are that the furloughed employee must have been employed on 30 October 2020, and the employer must have submitted a Real Time Information (RTI) submission to HMRC for the employee between 20 March 2020 and 30 October 2020, notifying a payment of earnings for that employee. This may differ where they have made employees redundant, or they stopped working for the employer on or after 23 September 2020 and have subsequently been re-employed.

For claim periods from 1 November to 30 April 2021, employers with a PAYE scheme can claim 80% of an employee’s usual hours worked, up to a maximum of £2,500 per month. The £2,500 cap is proportional to the hours not worked.

Changes to the scheme from 1 May 2021

It was announced on 3 March 2021 that the CJRS was to be extended further, beyond 30 April 2021 to 30 September 2021. To be eligible for furlough from the 1 May 2021 onwards, the employee must have been employed on 2 March 2021 and the employer must have submitted a Real Time Information (RTI) submission to HMRC for the employee between 20 March 2020 and 2 March 2021, notifying a payment of earnings for that employee.

For claim periods from 1 May to 30 June 2021, employers with a PAYE scheme will be able to claim 80% of an employee’s usual hours worked, up to a maximum of £2,500 per month. The £2,500 cap is proportional to the hours not worked.

From 1 July 2021, the scheme supports 70% of salaries for hours not worked, reducing to 60% from 1 August 2021.

Further information about the job retention scheme can be found on the Internet here:.

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 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.

These statistics are classed as Experimental Statistics as they are still in development.

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 15 March 2021 for support for the wages of furloughed staff up to 28 February 2021. The data for February is incomplete as claims relating to February may still be filed; thus, the figures for February should therefore be considered provisional results and will be revised in future releases.

Methodology (except table 1)

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 criteria for eligibility for the CJRS were amended for the CJRS extension.

The numbers of jobs presented as ‘eligible employments’ and used to calculate take-up figures reflect the criteria for eligibility for the extension to the CJRS scheme. They are based on a list of employees employed on 30 October 2020 and included in PAYE Real Time Information submissions for 20 March 2020 to 30 October 2020. Only employments in RTI submissions received by HMRC by 30 October are counted.

Following the criteria for qualifying for the scheme, this is supplemented by a list of people who were employed on 23 September 2020 but who left their job before 30 October and who were later re-employed by the same employer.

In this release employers are described as eligible to claim the CJRS if they employed staff for which the criteria to be eligible for furlough were met. Employers are grouped into size bands in some tables according to the number of employees they had who were eligible to be furloughed under the extension to CJRS.

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.

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 been 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 15 March 2021.

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.

Methodology (cumulative figures - table 1)

The methodology used for the figure for the cumulative number of jobs ever furloughed since the start of the scheme (table 1 above and tables 1, 1a, 1b in the spreadsheet accompanying this release) has been improved. For figures up to 13 December 2020, the method used was based on the figures for the total number of jobs furloughed on each claim. This choice had to be made because at the time the job-level information available for statistical purposes was incomplete for larger claims.

Over time – and particularly with the introduction of the CJRS extension – the previous method had started to undercount the total number of jobs furloughed.

The original method took the total number of jobs furloughed from all the claims made by each PAYE scheme. It then found the maximum number of jobs furloughed for each employer across all their claims. Finally, it summed these values for all PAYE schemes to arrive at a total number of employees furloughed.

The new approach uses job-level data. For this, we calculate the number of unique National Insurance numbers in the claims made by each employer, and then sum these. This information is supplemented by the employee’s name and payroll number in a small number of cases.

The cumulative number of employers making CJRS claims is calculated as the number of distinct PAYE schemes that have submitted a claim since the start of the scheme. The cumulative value of claims made is calculated as the sum of the amount claimed for each submitted claim.

Since the introduction of flexible furlough employers have been able to cancel claims made on the CJRS claims portal within 72 hours of making a claim. From the figures dated 15 February 2021 onwards, claims cancelled in this way have been excluded.

HMRC separately publishes figures for the value of claims paid to employers, in its monthly publication on tax receipts. Those figures are on a cash basis and reflect the time that the payments were made rather than the date that claims were received, so are slightly different to the figures included in this release.

Rounding of figures in the tables accompanying this release

Rounding has been applied to the figures in the tables accompanying this release, with counts rounded to the nearest 10 for Tables 17 and 18 Local Authority by sector, and to the nearest 100 for all other tables, amounts are rounded to the nearest million.

User questions and feedback

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.

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 15 March 2021 for support for the wages of furloughed staff up to 28 February 2021, rather than a sample. 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

In future iterations of this statistics release there may be some further revisions reflecting improvements to the data processing and methodology.

The figures in this release incorporate data on claims received by HMRC up to 15 March 2021 and cover employments furloughed up to 28 February 2021. The data for February is incomplete as late claims for the CJRS extension may still be filed with reasonable excuse and HMRC agreement. Amendments to February claims may be made until 29 March 2021.

Based on figures for January it is expected that these factors will result in an increase in the level of furloughed jobs reported for February of about 4%. Thus, the figures for February should therefore be considered provisional results and are likely to be revised slightly upwards in a future release.

Related links

Earnings and employment from Pay As You Earn Real Time Information, UK: March 2021 - Employee and earnings statistics from PAYE Real Time Information.

Labour market in the regions of the UK: March 2021 - Regional breakdowns of changes in UK employment, unemployment and economic activity.

Employment in the UK: March 2021 - Estimates of employment, unemployment and economic inactivity for the UK.

Average weekly earnings in Great Britain: March 2021 - 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.