Friday, half five. The fryers are up to temperature, the queue is at the door, and on the whiteboard in the back there are four names and four different sets of rules: a 16-year-old on the counter, a 17-year-old on the fryers, a 21-year-old doing the close, and a Saturday-only student who turns up when her netball season allows. Paying them correctly isn't complicated, but it isn't automatic either. Most chip shop payroll errors aren't dodgy — they're the birthday nobody noticed, the twenty minutes of mopping nobody logged, the holiday paid at the wrong rate. Here's how to keep it clean.

Age bands, birthdays and the apprentice trap

Minimum wage rates in the UK are set by age band, and they are reviewed every April. Don't rely on the figure you remember from last year — check the current rates and the current bands on GOV.UK before you set pay for the new financial year.

The bands have shifted around in recent years, so treat the structure as something to confirm rather than assume. Apprentices get a separate, lower rate, but only while they are under 19 or in the first year of their apprenticeship. After that, the age-based rate applies like anyone else.

Where shops slip up is birthdays. A member of staff who turns 18 partway through a pay period is entitled to the higher rate from that date, not from the first of the following month. Put every date of birth in a calendar with a reminder a week ahead, and raise the rate on the day. It's a small cost, and it removes an argument you would lose.

If you're considering taking on someone below school leaving age, check with your local authority first. Minimum wage rules don't apply to children that young, but child employment rules do, and they are stricter — permitted hours, permits and restrictions that a busy chippy will find awkward on a Friday night.

The hours you actually have to pay for

Working time is time the worker is working, or required to be at the shop and available for work. That covers more than the rota suggests. These are the ones that get missed:

• Prep before opening. If they're peeling, battering or setting up the counter, that's work — even if the doors aren't open.
• Closing down. Mopping, filtering the oil, cashing up, taking the bins out, waiting for a lift home because it's gone midnight.
• Mandatory training. Food hygiene refreshers, allergen briefings, new till software.
• Dead time on shift. If they can't leave and have to stay available, it's usually working time, not a break.
• Uniform and changing. If you require it on site, err towards paying for it.
• Shifts that run long. The rush doesn't finish at 8pm because the rota said so. Record the actual finish time.

Record real clock-in and clock-out times rather than rounding. Rounding looks tidy, but if it consistently works in the shop's favour it can push average pay below the minimum wage, which is a problem you really don't want.

Breaks: different rules for under-18s

Adult workers are entitled to an uninterrupted 20-minute break once a shift goes over six hours, plus daily and weekly rest between shifts. Under-18s get a better deal: a 30-minute break after four and a half hours, longer daily rest, a maximum working day and week, and restrictions on late-night work. If your fryers are still on at 10pm, that last one matters.

Breaks can be unpaid if the person is genuinely free from duties and can walk away from the counter. Put that in the contract. But a "break" where they're still serving customers whenever the door goes is not a break, and if that's how every Friday runs, fix the staffing rather than the paperwork.

A quick word on late closes

Young workers generally shouldn't be working between 10pm and 6am, with narrow exceptions. If a 17-year-old is regularly locking up at midnight, you've got a rota problem and a compliance problem.

Holiday pay: it builds up whether you track it or not

Statutory holiday is 5.6 weeks a year, capped at 28 days. A part-timer working three days a week gets 16.8 days. Somebody on irregular hours accrues holiday as they work, which is where the 12.07% figure comes from. Since April 2024 there has also been provision to pay holiday as rolled-up pay for irregular-hours workers, provided it is calculated properly and shown clearly on the payslip. This is an area that has changed recently, so check the current rules before you alter how you do it.

Two points catch people out. Holiday accrues on overtime and extra shifts, not just contracted hours. And holiday should be paid at what the person would normally have earned — including regular overtime — not just at their basic hourly rate. Averaging pay over a reference period is the usual approach.

Five errors that turn up again and again

1. The unpaid trial shift. If they're making chips and serving customers, they're working. A short paid trial is fine; an unpaid evening's labour is not.
2. Deductions that break the minimum wage. Taking money out of wages for till shortages, breakages or lost uniforms can drop pay below the legal floor. Only deduct what is properly agreed in writing, and never below the minimum.
3. No payslip. Every worker is entitled to one, and where pay varies with hours it has to show those hours. Cash in an envelope with no paperwork is a record-keeping disaster waiting to happen.
4. Round-number holiday pay. Paying everyone the same holiday rate regardless of what they usually earn is an easy shortcut and a common complaint.
5. Calling staff self-employed. If you control when they work and how the job is done, they're a worker, whatever the invoice says.

A payroll routine that holds up

Keep it simple and boring. Every week: collect actual times, note any missed breaks and any extra duties, and update holiday accrued. Every month: check birthdays coming up and any apprentice who has passed their first-year anniversary. Every April: check the new rates on GOV.UK and update your spreadsheet before the first payday after the change.

Keep records for at least six years, and keep the holiday calculations you did. If a former employee queries their final payslip, having the working saved takes ten minutes off the problem.

And if you're not sure whether a deduction is lawful, or how to work out holiday for someone whose hours swing from four a week to twenty, pay an accountant or payroll bureau who knows hospitality to look at it. That costs far less than sorting out a back-pay claim on a busy Saturday.

Photo: Surprising_Media / Pixabay