blogs > Compliance

R day and Fair Work Agency

Holiday pay compliance is changing – what the FWA and R-day mean for your business

April 2026 is shaping up to be one of the most significant moments for payroll compliance in recent years. Two changes are landing at the same time, and together they raise the stakes considerably for employers. The first is R-day...

Timeline for Plan to Make Work Pay

The Plan to Make Work Pay – what’s changing and when you need to act

The government released a critical update on 3 February 2026 about their Plan to Make Work Pay. This is the biggest change to employment law in a generation, and it’s going to affect every UK business over the next couple...

Payrolling of benefits April 27

Compulsory payrolling of benefits from April 2027 – what employers need to know

The landscape of benefits administration is set to change significantly. From April 2027, (it was to be April 2026 but the date when all employers were to comply was postponed until April 2027) the government will make payrolling of benefits...

Check your tax code

Why employees must check their HMRC tax code notices

Nobody wants a nasty surprise from HMRC. Yet every year, thousands of employees overpay tax or discover they owe money simply because they didn’t check their tax code was correct. Annually, around a third of all tax codes issued by...

Changes to statutory payments April 26

Don’t get caught out by changes to Statutory Payments from April 2026

The Government has announced the new statutory payments rates for April 2026, and if you’re thinking this is just another routine annual increase, think again. While most of the changes follow the expected CPI rise, there’s a fundamental shift happening...

ISO quality standards in payroll

Beyond the compliance checkbox – why Ascend holds three ISO standards

When you’re trusting someone with your payroll, you’re handing over some of the most sensitive data your business holds. Employee personal information, bank details, salaries, and National Insurance numbers. The works. Most payroll providers will tell you they take security...

Salary sacrifice v pay rise - mobile phone

Mobile phone benefit vs pay rise – which delivers more value?

Employer National Insurance costs are going up. Personal tax thresholds have been frozen for years. If you’re an employer trying to figure out how to reward your team without breaking the bank, you’re not alone. When considering employee remuneration, employers...

National Minimum Wage excessive hours analysis

The annual excessive hours analysis for National Minimum Wage – do you really need one?

If you’ve got salaried employees on your payroll, you’ve probably wondered whether you’re legally required to carry out an annual excessive hours analysis for National Minimum Wage compliance. Maybe not surprisingly, the answer isn’t straightforward. It depends on how your...

Universal Credit and Payroll

Understanding Universal Credit and payroll

As payroll professionals, we occasionally receive queries from clients about discrepancies between the figures we’ve submitted via FPS (Full Payment Submission) and the amounts HMRC has forwarded to the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP). These discrepancies can directly impact...

The benefits of Payroll Giving

Payroll giving – the tax-efficient way to support causes you care about

The payroll sector is full of complexity, and that’s putting it mildly. But here’s something that doesn’t have to be complicated – supporting charities through your workplace. Payroll giving is one of those rare things that actually works exactly as...