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National Minimum Wage check

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Summary

How to check the National Minimum Wage in Sage Payroll.

Description

There’s a minimum hourly amount you have to pay your employees. The amount depends on the employee's age and work status. This is the National Minimum Wage.

You can use Sage Payroll to check that you aren’t paying below this amount.

This keeps you compliant and ensures you pay your employees the correct amount.

Resolution

What is the National Minimum Wage?

This is the Minimum wage you have to pay an employee. The figure depends on their age and their employment status. This isn’t optional and is a legal requirement.

NOTE:

It doesn't matter how small your company is, you still have to pay the correct minimum wage. 

▼2026/27 National Minimum Wage and National Living Wage
Employee age Hourly rate
21 and over £12.71
18 - 20 years £10.85
16 - 17 years £8.00
Apprenticeships Read our article Paying apprentices the correct national minimum wage
▼2025/26 National Minimum Wage and National Living Wage
Employee age Hourly rate
21 and over £12.21
18 - 20 years £10.00
16 - 17 years £7.55
Apprenticeships Read our article Paying apprentices the correct national minimum wage

To see how the National Minimum Wage affects your business, read the HMRC article The National Minimum Wage and Living Wage at gov.uk.

National Minimum Wage check

Sage Payroll performs a National Minimum Wage check in your pay run. It will use your pay date as the reference point. It checks if your hourly payments meet legislation for the National Minimum Wage.

You’ll see a warning if this isn’t the case.

NOTE:

The check only applies to hourly payments, not deductions. 

You can check your hourly pay rates are correct and change them if necessary.

You can get help to process your pay run. Read our article processing a pay run.

Employee Minimum Wage report

You can run a report to check which Minimum Wage band your employees are in, and what their rate per hour is

To run the report:

  1. In the menu bar, select Reporting and Employee Minimum Wage Rates.
  2. Choose the required Tax Year, Frequency and Period.
  3. Select Generate.
  4. If required, you can then Export to a PDF or a CSV file.

NOTE:

If there’s no value in the rate per-hour column, you’ve entered an incorrect date of birth. For example, the employee start date, which means the employee is too young to qualify.