Extending furlough with just six hours’ notice at the weekend was simply not fair for employers and employees, according to Blick Rothenberg.

The tax and advisory firm fear that the extension of the furlough scheme may be too late to save a number of jobs, including some within the estate agency sector.

Heather Self, tax partner at Blick Rothenberg, commented: “Employers are supposed to agree any changes to employees’ contracts in advance – how are they supposed to do that at six hours’ notice at a weekend?

“While it is welcome news that additional support is being offered to businesses during the new lockdown restrictions, the change may well come too late to save jobs.”

The furlough scheme has previously proved a success and supported a number of people and businesses, which is why the government has opted to extend it until next month.

Self continued: “The chancellor repeatedly said that the furlough scheme would not be extended, but has now done a last-minute U-turn and has postponed the job support scheme for at least a month. The extension is more generous, but the very short notice is a Hallowe’en nightmare for employers and jobs that could have been saved may now be lost.

“Businesses need to be able to plan ahead through the winter and into 2021. We urge the Chancellor to set out a plan to support businesses in the months ahead, rather than reacting on a week by week basis to changing circumstances.”

The furlough scheme was supposed to be replaced with the new, less generous Job Support Scheme (JSS), which will eventually cover 67% of wages when it replaces furlough.

She added: “Employees will receive 80% of their wages from the government for any hours not worked, with their employer being responsible for national insurance and pension contributions – a cost of around 5% for an employee on average earnings. This is more generous than the JSS, which only offered a minimum of 67% for closed businesses and 73% for businesses where an employee worked at least 20% of their usual hours.

“It is also better than the last two months of the furlough scheme, where employers had to make an additional contribution of 10% or 20% of pay.”

“The furlough extension takes us back to the rules which applied in August, with one important change: the extension is open to any employee who was on the payroll, and for whom a PAYE return had been made, by 30 October.

“This means that employees who joined after 19 March, and employers who had not previously used the furlough scheme, will be able to make a claim for November.”