How SSP Is Worked Out: Qualifying Days, Daily Rates and Worked Examples
Almost every argument about Statutory Sick Pay comes down to the same misunderstanding. People see £123.25 a week and expect that figure to land in their account. SSP is not paid as a weekly lump sum. It is paid per qualifying day, and the daily rate depends on how many days a week you work.
This page works through the whole calculation with real numbers, using the rules in force for 2026/27. It is general information rather than advice on your own situation.
Start With the Weekly Rate
For 2026/27, SSP is £123.25 a week, or 80% of your normal weekly earnings, whichever is lower.
Both parts always apply. £123.25 is a ceiling, not a flat payment. Since the earnings threshold was removed on 6 April 2026 there is no longer any minimum you have to earn to qualify, so the 80% comparison is what determines what a lower earner actually receives.
| Normal weekly earnings | 80% of earnings | Weekly SSP |
|---|---|---|
| £100 | £80.00 | £80.00 |
| £140 | £112.00 | £112.00 |
| £154.06 | £123.25 | £123.25 |
| £300 | £240.00 | £123.25 |
| £700 | £560.00 | £123.25 |
Anyone earning about £154 a week or more gets the full £123.25. Below that, the 80% figure applies instead.
Working Out Your Average Weekly Earnings
Your earnings figure is not last week's payslip. It is an average taken over a relevant period of eight weeks, ending with the last normal payday before your sickness started.
If you are paid weekly, add up the gross pay in that period and divide by the number of whole weeks in it. If you are paid monthly, add up the gross pay, divide by the number of whole months, multiply by 12, and divide by 52.
Monthly-paid example. You are paid on the 25th. You go off sick on 10 June. The last two paydays before that are 25 May and 25 April, and the relevant period runs from 26 March to 25 May. Gross pay across those two months was £1,850 and £1,910, so £3,760 in total. That is £3,760 ÷ 2 = £1,880, × 12 = £22,560, ÷ 52 = £433.85 average weekly earnings. Eighty per cent of that is £347.08, which is above £123.25, so you get the full weekly rate.
Gross means before tax and National Insurance, and it includes overtime, commission and bonuses that were actually paid in that period. If you have been in the job less than eight weeks, the average is worked out from whatever earnings there have been up to the first day of sickness.
Qualifying Days: The Bit That Changes the Answer
SSP is only payable on qualifying days. Those are normally the days you are contracted or expected to work. There has to be at least one qualifying day in each week, even for people who work irregularly.
The daily rate is the weekly rate divided by the number of qualifying days in that week. That means the same person receives a different amount per day depending on their working pattern.
| Qualifying days per week | Daily SSP at the full rate |
|---|---|
| 7 | £17.6071 |
| 6 | £20.5416 |
| 5 | £24.65 |
| 4 | £30.8125 |
| 3 | £41.0833 |
| 2 | £61.625 |
| 1 | £123.25 |
Notice what that means in practice. Someone who works two days a week and is off sick for both of them gets the same £123.25 as someone who works five days and is off for all five. SSP replaces a week of your working pattern, whatever that pattern is.
Three waiting days are gone. Until 6 April 2026, SSP skipped the first three qualifying days of every absence. That was abolished. SSP is now payable from the first qualifying day, so a short absence is worth something where it used to be worth nothing.
Worked Examples
Monday to Friday, off for three days
You work five days a week and earn £520 a week, so you get the full rate. Five qualifying days means £123.25 ÷ 5 = £24.65 a day. You are off sick Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday.
Three qualifying days at £24.65 is £73.95. Under the old rules those three days would have been the waiting days and you would have received nothing.
Two days a week on a low wage
You work Tuesdays and Thursdays and your average weekly earnings are £120. Eighty per cent of £120 is £96, which is lower than £123.25, so your weekly SSP is £96.
Two qualifying days means £96 ÷ 2 = £48 a day. Off sick for one Tuesday, you get £48. Off for both days in the week, you get £96. Before April 2026 you would have been below the earnings threshold and received nothing at all.
Four-day compressed week, off for two weeks
You work Monday to Thursday, ten hours a day, earning £600 a week. Full rate applies. Four qualifying days gives £123.25 ÷ 4 = £30.8125 a day.
Two full working weeks off is eight qualifying days, so 8 × £30.8125 = £246.50, which is simply two weeks of SSP. The daily rate is higher than a five-day worker's, but the weekly total is identical.
How Long It Runs
SSP lasts a maximum of 28 weeks in any one period of sickness or linked series of them.
Two absences link together if the gap between them is eight weeks or less, and a linked series counts as one continuous period. Your 28-week clock does not reset, it carries on from where it stopped. There is also a longer stop: a linked series with the same employer that runs for more than three years ends SSP entitlement regardless of how many of the 28 weeks you have used.
When SSP runs out, your employer issues form SSP1 and you would normally look at New Style Employment and Support Allowance or Universal Credit. Our article on long-term sickness covers what happens next.
Tax, National Insurance and Company Sick Pay
SSP is treated as earnings. Income tax and National Insurance come off it in the normal way, so the amount reaching your bank account is less than the figures above.
SSP is a legal minimum, not a maximum. If your contract has an occupational sick pay scheme, that is what you get, and it may well be full pay for a period. Most schemes are written to absorb the SSP element rather than sit on top of it, so read the wording in your contract or staff handbook rather than assuming the two add together.
Rounding. Employers work the daily figure to several decimal places and round the total for the absence, rather than rounding each day to the nearest penny. On a long absence that difference is worth a few pounds, so if your payslip is a little under what you expected, this is often why.
Check It Yourself
Payroll errors on SSP are common, particularly since the April 2026 changes, and the ones that recur are paying from the fourth day out of habit, using the old weekly rate, and applying an earnings threshold that no longer exists.
Work out what you expect using the steps above, or put your figures into the SSP calculator, and compare it with your payslip. If they disagree, ask payroll to show you the qualifying days and the average weekly earnings they used. That is usually enough to find the mistake.