NMW Payroll Checker
Your payroll system checks the rate you set. This checks the rate you actually paid: the statutory minimum wage calculation, worker by worker, pay reference period by pay reference period. In the March 2026 naming round, 389 employers were found to have underpaid 60,000 workers, and very little of it was deliberate. Most of it came from salary sacrifice, uniform deductions, premium pay and unpaid working time. This tool screens your payroll for those errors every month.
The calculation HMRC actually runs
Premiums stripped, salary sacrifice handled, uniform and training deductions applied, accommodation offset calculated, absence pay separated. Built on the DBT "Calculating the minimum wage" guidance and the HMRC manual, with the statutory authority cited at every step of every calculation.
Checked period by period
The law checks pay reference periods rather than months, and a compliant month can hide a breached week. Weekly-paid staff get a verdict for every week, so a deduction in week two is caught even when the month as a whole looks fine.
A verdict for every worker
Clear, at risk, breach, or cannot assess. Breaches come with the shortfall, the arrears at current rates, the worst-case penalty exposure, and a calculation trail an auditor can follow line by line.
An evidence pack on every run
Each run exports a Word report, the full calculation trail, and your input file with a cryptographic fingerprint. Employers must keep records proving minimum wage compliance for six years, and twelve runs a year builds that record.
Your data never leaves your device
The payroll file is parsed and calculated in your browser. No names, dates of birth or pay data are transmitted or stored. The tool keeps a run manifest and per-worker verdicts against your payroll references, nothing more.
Clear about its limits
Blank fields are recorded as assumptions in the report. Where data is missing, the verdict is "cannot assess" rather than a pass. A working-time checklist records what your hours data does and does not include. The calculation is deterministic and versioned, and no AI is involved.
What the tool includes
- Full statutory NMW calculation per worker per pay reference period
- Salary sacrifice, deductions, premiums, tips, accommodation offset and absence pay all handled to the published methodology
- Salaried, hourly, weekly, fortnightly and four-weekly staff in one file
- Apprentice rate logic, birthday rate flips and the mid-period birthday rule
- Arrears calculated at current rates (the real liability), plus worst-case penalty exposure and the public-naming threshold
- Headroom on every clear worker: how close each one sits to the floor
- CSV or Excel upload with flexible column matching for real payroll exports
- Printed column mapping and validation report, so you can see exactly how your file was read
- Word report with executive summary, per-worker detail and remediation notes
- Evidence pack export: your record for the six-year record-keeping duty, held by you
- Run history with year-on-year comparison
- April rate changes maintained for you, with historic rates back to 2019 for arrears
- 🔐 Client-side processing: your payroll file never leaves your browser
- ✓ Built by a Chartered FCIPD HR professional and tested against 6,000-worker payrolls
- ✓ Every calculation step cites its statutory authority
- ✓ Deterministic, versioned calculations with no AI involved
From April 2026 the National Living Wage is £12.71. On a 37.5-hour week that is an annualised floor of roughly £24,900, which means any salaried worker under £27,000 is now in the risk zone. A single 5% pension salary sacrifice is enough to tip a £26,000 worker under the floor. This is no longer only a hospitality and care problem; it reaches office payrolls and professional firms.
The penalty is 200% of arrears, up to £20,000 per worker, plus public naming at £500 of arrears. The Fair Work Agency can demand six years of records and inspect without a complaint. The breach causes are the same every naming round: deductions that drag pay below the floor, unpaid working time, apprentice rate errors, and salary sacrifice left unreviewed after the April uplift. Most of it is technical error rather than deliberate underpayment, which is why a routine monthly check catches it.
HMRC offers employers a free NMW health check. The catch is that it involves HMRC. This one is private: you find the problem and fix it on your own terms.
How is this different from the check in my payroll software?
Payroll software checks the rate you set against the published rates. HMRC checks the rate you actually paid: after deductions, sacrifice, stripped premiums and unpaid working time. Almost every employer on the naming list had payroll software. None of them thought they were underpaying.
What data do I need?
A payroll extract per pay period: worker reference, date of birth, pay, hours and pay period dates gets you a screening check. Add deductions, premiums and absence columns for the full check. The tool tells you what it could and couldn't assess either way, and a CSV template is included.
Is a CLEAR verdict a guarantee of compliance?
No. A CLEAR verdict means your data, on your declarations, cleared the statutory calculation. It is a screening tool: verdicts need verifying against source records before you act on them, and the terms set out who is responsible for what.
What happens after I buy?
An invite email within a few minutes of checkout. Set your password, sign in, upload your first extract. Most first runs take under fifteen minutes, including reading the results.
Found a problem?
If a run finds a breach and you want a second pair of eyes on the fix, that is consultancy work I do every week.