Coronavirus: Government pay for self employed 2020 – 2021

The government’s Self Employment Income Support Scheme (SEISS) ended on 30 September 2021. We are leaving this outline of the Scheme on our website for a while longer for the benefit of anyone who might want to refer to it.

Summary of the SEISS grant amounts

The first grant covered the 3-month period from May to July 2020. It represented 80% of average monthly trading profits and was capped at £2,500 per month or £7,500 in total.

The second grant was for the period August to October 2020 and was 70% of average monthly trading profits over 3 months, capped at £6,570.

The third grant covered November 2020 to January 2021. This time, eligible self-employed people could once again get a grant calculated at 80% of their average trading profits, capped at £7,500.

The fourth grant was for the period from February to April 2021, and continued to offer 80% of average trading profits, capped at £7,500 in total.

Self-employed people who submitted their 2019/20 tax returns by 2 March 2021 could submit their self-assessment tax returns for 2018/19 and 2019/20 as evidence of their earnings and of the impact the pandemic had on their business.

This gave scope for the newly self-employed to qualify, whereas previously they hadn’t been able to.

The fifth and final grant covered the period 1 May to end September 2021.

Eligibility for this final grant was more demanding than for the previous grants and was based on criteria set out in three Stages:

1. Your trading status, 2. Your tax returns, trading profits and non-trading income, 3. Your intentions to keep trading in 2021 to 2022 and the impact of Covid-19 on your trading profits between 1 May and 30 September 2021.

For full details see government guidance on claiming for the fifth SEISS grant.

More details about the first four SEISS grants

Each of these payments was a single instalment covering 3 months’ worth of your average monthly trading profits and based on average income over the last three years.

Each grant was subject to tax and National Insurance contributions.

You could claim these grants and continue to do business.

Who could get an SEISS grant?

The Scheme was only open to people with trading profits of up to £50,000 (which covered 95% of self-employed people). Self-employed people who earn more did not qualify.

Only people who made the majority of their income from self-employment were eligible. So if you were employed but had a ‘side job’ which was self-employed, you were not eligible.

It was only for those who had submitted a tax return covering the relevant tax year (to minimise fraud).

The scheme was open to people from across UK.

Further conditions

You had to confirm that your business had been affected by the virus on or after the dates given by the government for each grant.

You had to make a declaration saying that you intended to continue trading and that you were either:
- currently actively trading but were adversely affected by reduced demand because of coronavirus OR
- previously trading but couldn’t do so temporarily because of Covid-19.

HMRC paid the grant straight into the bank account of eligible self-employed people, after asking them to fill in an online form.