Maternity Leave UK: The Complete Employer Guide

Eligible employees in the UK can take up to 52 weeks of maternity leave, and at least two of those weeks immediately after birth are compulsory and cannot be waived ^[1]. Statutory Maternity Pay runs for up to 39 of those weeks, at 90% of average weekly earnings for the first six weeks and then £194.32 a week or 90% of earnings if lower for the 2026-27 tax year ^[2]. Maternity leave and maternity pay are separate entitlements with separate rules, and an employer that conflates the two is the most common cause of a maternity dispute.

Maternity leave is a complex area because it bundles together leave duration, pay, notice obligations, continued employment rights, protection from detriment and a return-to-work guarantee. Each of those carries its own deadline or condition, and several changed in recent reforms.

This guide sets out the full picture for employers: who qualifies, how long the leave lasts, how pay is calculated, what notice each side must give, which rights continue throughout the leave, how redundancy protection now works, and how the payments are reported to and recovered from HMRC.

Key takeaways

• Maternity leave is a day-one right of up to 52 weeks, split into 26 weeks of ordinary leave and 26 weeks of additional leave.
• At least two weeks immediately after birth are compulsory, rising to four weeks for factory workers.
• Statutory Maternity Pay lasts up to 39 weeks and requires 26 weeks of continuous service and earnings at or above £129 a week.
• Holiday continues to accrue throughout maternity leave, and the employer maintains pension contributions based on the employee's normal salary during paid leave.
• Enhanced redundancy protection now runs until 18 months after the birth, extending beyond the leave itself.

What maternity leave is and who qualifies

Statutory Maternity Leave is the right of an employee to take time off around the birth of a child. It totals 52 weeks, divided into 26 weeks of Ordinary Maternity Leave followed by 26 weeks of Additional Maternity Leave ^[1]. The earliest the leave can start is 11 weeks before the expected week of childbirth, and it starts automatically if the employee is off work for a pregnancy-related reason in the four weeks before the due date ^[3].

The day-one right to leave

Maternity leave itself carries no minimum service requirement. Any employee qualifies from the first day of employment, regardless of how long they have worked for the employer or how much they earn ^[4]. This is the key distinction between leave and pay: the leave is a day-one right, while pay depends on separate service and earnings tests covered below ^[1]. Workers who are not employees, such as agency workers without employee status, do not qualify for statutory maternity leave although they may have other entitlements ^[4].

Compulsory maternity leave

An employee does not have to take the full 52 weeks, but the law sets a floor. At least two weeks of leave immediately after the birth are compulsory, and an employer commits an offence by allowing a return to work during that period ^[1]. The compulsory period rises to four weeks for those working in a factory ^[3]. Beyond that minimum, the employee chooses how much of the entitlement to use. A separate explainer looks at how long maternity leave lasts and how the paid and unpaid portions fit together.

How maternity pay works during leave

Statutory Maternity Pay is the payment that supports an employee through the early part of maternity leave. It is payable for up to 39 weeks, leaving the final 13 weeks of a full 52-week leave unpaid unless the contract provides more ^[1]. Modern HMRC-recognised payroll software for SMEs calculates the rate changes automatically across the 39 weeks, but the underlying rules are worth understanding.

The two SMP rates

SMP has two distinct phases. For the first six weeks it is paid at 90% of the employee's average weekly earnings with no upper cap. For the remaining 33 weeks it drops to the lower of £194.32 a week or 90% of average weekly earnings for the 2026-27 tax year ^[2]. Average weekly earnings are measured over the eight weeks up to and including the last payday before the end of the qualifying week, the 15th week before the week the baby is due ^[7].

To qualify for SMP an employee must have at least 26 weeks of continuous service into the qualifying week and average weekly earnings at or above the Lower Earnings Limit, which is £129 a week for the 2026-27 tax year ^[3]. The table below summarises the two phases.

When SMP cannot be paid

An employee who does not meet the service or earnings test cannot receive SMP. In that case the employer issues form SMP1 and the employee usually claims Maternity Allowance from the Department for Work and Pensions instead, worth up to £194.32 a week for up to 39 weeks ^[14]. The mechanics of that handover are covered in the dedicated guide to the SMP1 form. Maternity Allowance uses a broader work test than SMP, so an employee with short service or irregular earnings may still qualify for state support even when the employer cannot pay ^[14].

Notice, the MATB1 and employer confirmation

The notice rules are symmetrical: each side has an obligation. The employee must tell the employer at least 15 weeks before the expected week of childbirth that they intend to take maternity leave, along with the due date and the intended start date ^[5]. The employer can ask for the MATB1 maternity certificate, the medical evidence of pregnancy issued by a midwife or doctor from around the 20th week of pregnancy ^[7].

Once notice is given, the employer must respond in writing within 28 days, confirming the date the maternity leave will end ^[5]. An employee can change the leave start date later by giving at least 28 days of notice ^[5]. Accountants managing this across several employers usually rely on a payroll bureau platform to track each scheme's notice dates and confirmation deadlines so none are missed.

Rights that continue during maternity leave

A frequent misconception is that maternity leave suspends the employment relationship. It does not. Most contractual rights continue throughout the leave, and the employee is entitled to any pay rises and improvements to terms granted during the period ^[6].

Holiday, pension and contractual terms

Annual leave continues to accrue throughout statutory maternity leave, including bank holidays, because the contract remains live ^[10]. An employee cannot take holiday and maternity leave at the same time, so accrued holiday is usually taken before or after the leave, and where the employee cannot use it within the holiday year the employer must allow it to carry over ^[10].

Pension treatment follows the pay. During paid maternity leave the employer continues to make pension contributions based on the salary the employee would have earned had they not been on leave, not on the reduced SMP they actually receive ^[12]. The employee's own contributions are based on their actual pay during the period ^[12]. For a fuller treatment of contribution duties, the guide to auto-enrolment sets out the assessment rules in detail.

Keeping in touch days

An employee can work up to 10 keeping in touch days during maternity leave without bringing the leave or pay to an end ^[6]. The days are optional for both sides, and the work can include training or any activity that maintains contact with the workplace ^[6]. Keeping in touch work is paid as agreed between the employee and the employer, and a single hour of work counts as a full keeping in touch day.

Antenatal appointments and protection from detriment

Pregnant employees are entitled to reasonable paid time off for antenatal appointments, including the travel time, and the law treats unfavourable treatment because of those appointments as unlawful ^[11]. After the first appointment the employer may ask for an appointment card or other evidence ^[11].

Pregnancy and maternity are protected characteristics, so an employee cannot be dismissed, selected for redundancy or treated detrimentally because of pregnancy, childbirth or maternity leave ^[9]. An employer who manages a pregnancy or maternity case must document decisions carefully, because the burden of showing that any detriment was unrelated to the pregnancy falls on the employer.

Returning to work and redundancy protection

An employee returning after Ordinary Maternity Leave has the right to come back to the same job. After Additional Maternity Leave the right is to return to the same job, or where that is not reasonably practicable, to a suitable and appropriate alternative on terms no less favourable ^[6]. An employee who intends to return at the end of the full leave does not need to give further notice; only an early return requires notice, normally eight weeks ^[6].

Redundancy protection was strengthened in April 2024. Where an employee with maternity leave entitlement is at risk of redundancy, the enhanced right to be offered a suitable alternative vacancy now runs until 18 months after the birth, extending well beyond the leave itself ^[8]. That gives an employee returning from a full year of leave a further six months of priority over other candidates for any suitable vacancy ^[8].

Splitting leave through shared parental leave

Maternity leave does not have to run as a single uninterrupted block taken by one parent. An employee can end maternity leave early and convert the balance into Shared Parental Leave, allowing up to 50 weeks of leave and 37 weeks of pay to be shared between two parents ^[13]. The first two compulsory weeks of maternity leave can never be shared ^[13].

From 6 April 2026, paternity leave and unpaid parental leave became day-one rights, and a partner can now take paternity leave after a period of shared parental leave rather than only before it ^[13]. These changes give families more flexibility in how they combine the available leave around a birth.

How employers report and recover maternity pay

Statutory Maternity Pay is treated as earnings. It is included in gross pay on the Full Payment Submission, and is subject to PAYE and Class 1 National Insurance like ordinary wages ^[15]. Payroll software that holds the HMRC Recognised badge submits the FPS automatically at the end of each payrun and reflects the statutory rates without manual reconfiguration.

The cost is largely reclaimable. An employer recovers 92% of the SMP paid through the Employer Payment Summary, rising to 109% under Small Employers' Relief for businesses whose Class 1 National Insurance was £45,000 or less in the previous tax year ^[15]. The additional compensation element rose from 8.5% to 9% on 6 April 2026 ^[15]. For software platforms that embed UK payroll, a payroll API handles the SMP calculation, the FPS reporting and the EPS recovery as part of the same engine, so the host product never has to build statutory pay logic itself.

Conclusion

Maternity leave in the UK is best understood as a set of interlocking entitlements rather than a single block of time off. The 52-week leave is a day-one right, the 39 weeks of pay sit on top with their own service and earnings tests, and around both run continuing rights to holiday, pension, contractual improvements and protection from detriment. The recent extension of redundancy protection to 18 months after birth means an employer's obligations now reach beyond the return to work.

For employers, the practical challenge is sequencing: the 15-week notice, the 28-day confirmation, the qualifying-week earnings calculation, the rate change at week seven and the recovery through the EPS all carry their own timing. As parental leave reform continues to expand day-one rights, the systems that cope best are those that surface each deadline automatically, so that maternity becomes a process the payroll runs rather than a problem the employer chases.

Frequently asked questions

How long is maternity leave in the UK?

Statutory maternity leave is up to 52 weeks, made up of 26 weeks of Ordinary Maternity Leave and 26 weeks of Additional Maternity Leave ^[1]. An employee does not have to take the full year, but must take at least two weeks immediately after the birth, or four weeks for factory workers ^[3]. The leave is a day-one right, so length of service does not affect entitlement to the leave itself.

Is maternity leave a day-one right or does it need a qualifying period?

Maternity leave is a day-one right with no minimum service requirement, available to any employee from their first day ^[4]. Statutory Maternity Pay is different: it requires 26 weeks of continuous service into the qualifying week and average weekly earnings at or above £129 a week for the 2026-27 tax year ^[3]. An employee can therefore be entitled to the leave but not the pay.

Does holiday build up during maternity leave?

Yes. Annual leave continues to accrue throughout statutory maternity leave, including bank holidays, because the employment contract stays live during the leave ^[10]. Holiday and maternity leave cannot be taken at the same time, so accrued leave is usually taken before or after the maternity period, and the employer must allow it to carry over where it cannot be used within the holiday year.

How much maternity pay can an employer recover from HMRC?

An employer recovers 92% of Statutory Maternity Pay through the Employer Payment Summary, or 109% under Small Employers' Relief if the business paid £45,000 or less in Class 1 National Insurance in the previous tax year ^[15]. The 109% figure reflects full recovery plus a 9% compensation element, which increased from 8.5% on 6 April 2026. Statutory Maternity Pay is reported in gross pay on the FPS and reclaimed via the EPS.