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Every worker is checked before their first shift, and the penalty starts at £45,000 a worker. Workers under 18 have limits on hours, night work and selling alcohol.
All guidesAn employer must check that a person is allowed to work in the UK before they start. From 1 October 2026 the Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Act 2025 widened who counts as an employer for these checks. The Home Office's employer's guide now covers people engaged on a contract of employment, on a worker's contract, as an individual sub-contractor, or through an online matching service.
Waiting staff, kitchen porters and bar staff on casual or zero-hours contracts are covered whatever their contract is called. Where a worker comes through an employment business that supplies temporary staff to bars and restaurants, the guide treats the employment business as the employer, and it carries out the check. Where a contract lets a worker send a substitute, the business can be liable for the person who turns up, so it needs a way to confirm the person working is the person checked.
For worker's contracts, sub-contractors and online matching services, a civil penalty can only be charged where the work started on or after 1 October 2026.
To have a statutory excuse against a penalty, you complete one of three checks before the worker starts:
A share code for work is nine characters long and begins with W. It lasts 90 days. You enter it with the worker's date of birth. Codes beginning with R or S are for other services and cannot be used. British and Irish citizens cannot get a share code. They prove their right to work with documents such as a passport, checked by hand or through a digital provider, which can check British and Irish passports up to six months past their expiry date.
You cannot insist on one method, and you must not treat anyone less favourably because of where they are from. A manager can carry out checks for you, but the business stays liable if they are done wrongly.
For a manual check, GOV.UK sets out three steps. See the original documents. Check they are valid with the applicant present. Make and keep copies, and record the date of the check. The employer's guide says writing a date on the copy is not enough by itself. Use the wording "The date on which this right to work check was made:" followed by the date, or a record made at the time.
Keep the copies securely for as long as the person works for you and for two years afterwards, then destroy them. Where the person's permission to work is time-limited, check again before it expires.
Some international students may work during term time, up to the number of hours shown on their eVisa or passport endorsement, for example 10 or 20 hours a week. A week runs from Monday to Sunday. Students with permission to work can work full time before their course starts, during vacations, and in the period after their course ends while their permission lasts.
For students with term-time limits, you must get and keep their term and vacation dates from their education provider. Students cannot fill a permanent full-time vacancy, except in the limited cases the Immigration Rules allow. Set each student's limit in the rota system so their shifts cannot pass it in a term-time week.
Under the code of practice in force from 1 October 2026, the civil penalty starts at £45,000 for each illegal worker on a first breach, and £60,000 for each worker where the business has been found employing illegal workers in the previous three years. The penalty is reduced by £5,000 a worker for reporting the suspected worker to the Home Office, and by £5,000 a worker for active co-operation.
Starting point £45,000 a worker, £90,000 in all. Less £5,000 a worker for reporting them and £5,000 for co-operating:
£70,000Starting point £60,000 a worker, £120,000 in all. Less the same reductions:
£100,000Knowingly employing someone without the right to work is a criminal offence, with up to five years in prison and an unlimited fine. A civil penalty can also affect a premises licence: licensing authorities can review, suspend or revoke a licence for the sale of alcohol or late night refreshment, and the Home Office can make representations against new licence applications. The business's name may be published on GOV.UK.
Children can work part-time from 14, or from 13 in some council areas, and full time only once they reach the minimum school leaving age. A council permit is needed where local byelaws require one, and the byelaws list jobs children cannot do. GOV.UK's limits for school-age children are:
| School-age child | Aged 14 | Aged 15 or 16 |
|---|---|---|
| Term time, a week | 12 hours | 12 hours |
| School days and Sundays | 2 hours | 2 hours |
| Saturdays in term time | 5 hours | 8 hours |
| School holidays, a week | 25 hours | 35 hours |
| Holiday weekdays and Saturdays | 5 hours | 8 hours |
| Holiday Sundays | 2 hours | 2 hours |
Children cannot work during school hours, before 7am or after 7pm, or for more than an hour before school unless byelaws allow it. They must have a break of at least an hour after four hours' work, and a two-week break from any work during the school holidays each calendar year. School-age children are not entitled to the National Minimum Wage, and children under 16 do not pay National Insurance.
These rules apply to young workers who are over the minimum school leaving age and under 18.
Young workers cannot work more than 8 hours a day or 40 hours a week. They are entitled to a 30-minute break when they work more than four and a half hours, 12 hours' rest between working days, and 48 hours' rest each week.
Staff aged 16 or 17 can never work between midnight and 4am. They normally cannot work between 10pm and 6am, or 11pm and 7am if the contract says so. The Working Time Regulations, regulation 27A, lift that restriction in "a hotel, public house, restaurant, bar or similar establishment", outside midnight to 4am, where the work keeps the service going or meets a sudden rise in demand, no adult is available, and it does not harm the young worker's education or training. An adult must supervise where that is needed to protect them, and they get an equal period of rest to make up.
The minimum wage from April 2026 is £8.00 an hour for under-18s and apprentices and £10.85 for 18 to 20-year-olds. From April 2027 it rises to £8.31 and £11.27.
Under section 153 of the Licensing Act 2003, a responsible person commits an offence if they knowingly allow someone under 18 to sell alcohol on licensed premises, unless each sale is specifically approved by a responsible person. The responsible person is the premises licence holder, the designated premises supervisor, or an adult either of them has authorised.
There is an exception for alcohol sold to be drunk with a table meal, in premises used for table meals, where alcohol is sold only to people eating. A 17-year-old waiter in a restaurant can serve wine with a meal under that exception. The same person serving at the bar of a pub needs an authorised adult to approve each sale.
Employers pay 0% National Insurance on the earnings of staff under 21, under category letter M, up to the upper secondary threshold of £967 a week or £50,270 a year. Apprentices under 25 have the same 0% band under letter H. The letter has to be set in payroll from the worker's date of birth, and changes on their 21st birthday.
15% on pay above £96 a week. A year at the same pay costs £1,825.20.
£35.100% on pay up to £967 a week, under category letter M.
£0.00Staff aged 16 to 21 are not automatically enrolled into a workplace pension, but they can ask to join. See the auto-enrolment guide.
We set each worker's minimum wage rate and National Insurance letter from their date of birth, change them on birthdays, and keep pension assessment and pay records in one payroll. See payroll, tips and tronc.
Yes. From 1 October 2026 workers on worker's contracts are covered. Where an employment business supplies the worker, it does the check.
The civil penalty starts at £45,000 a worker on a first breach and £60,000 on a repeat breach within three years.
Not after midnight. Work between 10pm and midnight is allowed in a pub, hotel or restaurant only where the conditions in regulation 27A are met.
With a table meal in a restaurant, yes. Otherwise each sale must be approved by the licence holder, the designated premises supervisor or an adult they authorise.
Not on earnings up to £967 a week, under category letter M.
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