2024 Uplift Guide for Maternity Leave

This guide will walk you through how to calculate your back pay due for your period of maternity leave, using the Doctors Paycheck Uplift Calculator. The maternity pay elements that are subject to the pay uplift are your Occupational Maternity Pay (OMP) and pay for your annual leave accrued during your maternity leave. Your Statutory Mandatory Pay (SMP) and unpaid weeks remain the same.

You will also receive back pay for any other jobs worked between 1st April 23 and 31st October 24, which can be calculated using the Uplift Calculator in the normal way.

Important Note: The calculation of maternity pay is often fraught with errors and niche complexities. This tool is not a maternity pay calculator and may well not account for every single possible situation. This tool assumes your maternity pay itself has been calculated correctly, and will provide a best-estimate for the value of back pay you should receive. Due to the small numbers of doctors this pertains to, and the various steps required to calculate maternity pay, we have not been able to fully and rigorously test this guide against numerous examples. If you have any further questions about how your maternity pay or maternity back pay has been calculated, we would recommend you speak to your employer and/or your union.

Choose User Type

The maternity guidance depends upon whether you are using the Free Uplift Calculator or the Doctors Paycheck Members version of the uplift calculator.

Please choose the calculator you wish to use.

Guide for Doctors Paycheck Members

All of these steps use the Doctors Paycheck Salary Analysis software, with all back pay values calculated using the 2024 Pay Uplift tab found within the results section.

Step 1: Identify your annual salary during your qualifying weeks

Simply create a Salary Analysis for the job which contained your qualifying weeks for your maternity leave pay, entering your total annual salary in the "Work Schedule Values" tab as per usual.

In rare situations, your qualifying weeks may span two jobs, which means your OMP will be based on one month’s pay from the first job and another month’s pay from the next. In this situation you will need to take the average of the two salaries. We recommend running a salary analysis for one of the jobs, but inputting the averaged annual salary values into the "Work Schedule Values" tab.

Sometimes pay for locum shifts or other arrears may occur during your qualifying weeks, and are factored into your pre-uplift OMP. These elements should not be uplifted and no back pay is due for these, so they are not included in this calculation.

Step 2: Determine your back pay for your 8 weeks of full pay OMP

Within the same Salary Analysis (which contained your qualifying weeks), in the 2024 Pay Uplift results tab, input the dates of your 8 weeks full pay OMP into the "When did you work this position" question. Toggle to calculate your uplift according to the Work Schedule (WS) values, and click "Calculate Uplift".

Note down the back pay values listed. (Note: we will soon be releasing an option to download these results instead).

Step 3: Determine your back pay for your 18 weeks of half pay OMP

Within the same Salary Analysis (which contained your qualifying weeks), in the 2024 Pay Uplift results tab, now input the dates of your half pay OMP (maximum of 18 weeks) into the "When did you work this position" question and click "Calculate Uplift" again. Divide the values for your back pay in this period by 2. Note down these values.

Step 4: Determine your back pay for your accrued annual leave

Important Note: Accrued annual leave is paid according to the job you were working just before you went on maternity leave, NOT based on your qualifying weeks pay. If you changed jobs between your qualifying weeks and starting maternity leave, you will need to create a Salary Analysis for the job you were working just before you went on maternity leave and use this instead.

Within the relevant Salary Analysis for the job you were working before you went on maternity leave, in the 2024 Pay Uplift results tab, now input the dates of your accrued annual leave into the "When did you work this position" question.

Note down the back pay values listed.

Step 5: Determine total back pay value for your whole maternity leave

Add together the values of back pay from Steps 2, 3 & 4. This will equate to your back-pay for your whole maternity leave period.

Notes
  1. This guide does not calculate your back pay for your time spent actually working, before and after your maternity leave. To calculate this back pay, please use the 2024 Pay Uplift calculator as normal.
  2. All back pay for your maternity leave will be paid by the employer you worked for just before going on maternity leave.
  3. There is no back pay for the unpaid portion of maternity leave, or for your Statutory Maternity Pay (SMP).
  4. Sometimes pay for locum shifts, or other arrears may occur during your qualifying weeks, and are factored into your pre-uplift OMP. These elements should not be uplifted and no back pay is due for these, so they are not included in this calculation.
  5. Maternity pay is often wrong, meaning your back pay calculations will therefore also be inaccurate. Unfortunately we do not yet have a comprehensive maternity pay calculator. If you believe your pre-uplift maternity pay is incorrect, please contact your trust to correct it, then you can run these uplift calculations again.
  6. If you have chosen to defer your maternity leave payments and receive them spread out over a longer period of months, you will need to input dates as if they have been paid according to the standard maternity leave schedule: 8 weeks of full pay OMP starting on the first day of your maternity leave, followed by up to 18 weeks of half pay OMP.
  7. If you are currently on maternity leave, your OMP and accrued annual leave payments after 1st November 2024 will need to be uplifted by your trust in line with the current payscale. Back pay is due for any OMP and accrued annual leave paid from 1st April 2023 - 31st October 2024.