Agricultural wages: guide for workers and employers - twenty eighth edition

8. Stable Income Arrangement (SIA) (Part 8)

What is SIA? (Article 30)

Wages Order 46 introduced a voluntary option of paying wages in equal instalments. This method of payment is known as the SIA.

• This will allow wages to be paid in equal instalments for each pay period regardless of the number of hours worked in each pay period. Payment by this method ensures that there are no fluctuations in pay where hours vary greatly according to either working patterns or the seasons.

Who is eligible for the SIA?

All agricultural workers in Scotland, can, through agreement between worker and employer, be paid by this method. Workers who work differing hours throughout the seasons of the year may benefit by receiving a regular pay at the end of each pay period. It may also benefit employers as outgoings would be consistent from week to week or month to month.

What conditions have to be met? (Article 31)

In order for a worker to be paid by this method a written contract of employment between the employer and the worker has to be in place and must specify the number of hours to be worked over a prescribed period, e.g. time to be worked over a year.

The payment of such hours must be calculated at not less than the appropriate minimum hourly rate prescribed in Part 2 of the Order in force at the time. Hours which attract the overtime rate must also be separately identified, and paid for at no less than the rates prescribed by Part 3 of the relevant Order. Details of how to calculate the payment of hours worked over a year are set out in the following examples:

Example 1 – Summer/Winter

13 weeks of 35 hours during the winter and 39 weeks of 40 hours in the summer.

• 35 hrs x 13 wks x £11.44 = £5,205.20
• 39 hrs x 39 wks x £11.44 = £17,400.24
• 1 hr x 39 wks x £17.16 = £669.24
• Total = £23,274.68

Example 2 – Weekend On/Weekend Off

Weekend on = 48 hours

Weekend off = 39 hours

• 39 hrs x 52 wks x £11.44 = £23,200.32
• 9 hrs x 26 wks x £17.16 = £4,015.44
• Total = £27,215.76

Example 3

52 weeks of 39 hours per week plus periods of overtime likely to be worked by a ‘tractor driver’.

• 39 hrs x 52 wks x £11.44 = £23,200.32
• 10 hrs x 4 wks x £17.16 = £686.40
• 12 hrs x 2 wks x £17.16 = £411.84
• 5 hrs x 4 wks x £17.16 = £343.20
• Total = £24,641.76

The employer must supply time sheets to the worker. The worker, in turn, must complete time sheets in order to record the hours worked. Completed time sheets will require to be maintained by the employer for a period of not less than three years.

What about holiday entitlement and sick pay?

Entitlement to holidays, absences due to ill-health and the other miscellaneous conditions of the Order apply to those on SIA as they do to workers being paid under Parts 2 and 3 of the Order.

Would the pay period change?

The pay period conditions under which a worker is employed need not change if payment by the SIA method is in place. Pay can be made on a weekly, fortnightly or monthly basis. It will be a matter of agreement between the worker and employer as to when pay is to be paid. Instalments should be calculated and paid over the entire period employed, including periods of holiday.