Paid below minimum wage? You can claim back pay plus a 200% penalty.

The National Minimum Wage is a legal floor — your employer cannot pay below it, regardless of what your contract says. If they have, you are entitled to every penny of the shortfall, plus an additional penalty on top.

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Paid below minimum wage? You can claim back pay plus a 200% penalty.

Last updated: April 2026

Current rates (April 2025 onwards)

These rates apply to employees, workers, and most agency workers. Self-employed people are not covered.

Common ways employers underpay — often without admitting it

Tips and service charges counted as wages

Since 2023, employers cannot use tips or service charges to make up the National Minimum Wage. Every tip must be on top of the statutory rate.

Deductions that take pay below the minimum

Deductions for uniforms, tools, accommodation (above the statutory offset), or cash shortfalls can push effective hourly pay below the legal minimum.

Travel between sites, mandatory training, time spent waiting on premises, or time "on call" on-site all count as working time and must be paid.

Sleep-in shifts at care homes

Following a series of tribunal cases, many sleep-in workers are owed back pay if they were paid a flat allowance below the hourly minimum.

Salary sacrifice schemes

If a salary sacrifice arrangement takes your effective pay below the statutory minimum, the employer must top it up.

Misclassifying workers as self-employed

If you are effectively a worker (personal service, employer control, no substitution), minimum wage applies regardless of the contract label.

Think you've been underpaid?

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How to claim unpaid minimum wage

Calculate the shortfall

Work out how many hours you worked, what you were paid, and what you should have received at the applicable rate. The shortfall is what you are owed.

Raise a grievance with your employer

Put the underpayment in writing. Your employer has a legal obligation to pay the correct rate. A written grievance creates a paper trail and may resolve the issue without a tribunal.

HMRC enforces the NMW and can investigate your employer, issue a Notice of Underpayment, and force repayment. You can report anonymously. HMRC can look back up to 6 years.

Claim via the Employment Tribunal

You can also claim the shortfall as an unlawful wage deduction in the Employment Tribunal. You have 3 months from the last underpayment (after Acas Early Conciliation). Tribunal claims can include a penalty of up to 200% of the underpayment.

To bring an Employment Tribunal claim (from the last underpayment, extended by Acas Early Conciliation period)

HMRC can investigate historic underpayments going back 6 years

County court claim for unpaid wages (breach of contract)

Frequently asked questions

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