Northern Ireland has confirmed Statutory Parental Bereavement Pay (SPBP) as a day‑one right from 6 April 2026. The Department for the Economy made the regulations on 1 April 2026 and, under the usual confirmatory process, they are laid before the Assembly for approval within six months while remaining in force. For employers, this removes the previous 26‑week service hurdle and brings pay entitlement into line with the intent of the 2022 Act.

The big operational shift is eligibility. From 6 April, a qualifying employee in Northern Ireland can access SPBP without any minimum service, provided they meet the weekly earnings threshold for statutory payments. Where earnings are atypical or there is not a full eight weeks’ pay history, entitlement can now be determined by reference to reasonable assumptions of expected earnings, ensuring new starters and variable‑hours staff are not excluded.

Payroll teams will need to reset how they calculate “normal weekly earnings”. The regulations confirm an eight‑week reference window up to the end of the period immediately preceding the bereavement. If an employee has not been paid for all of those weeks, you use the continuous weeks that exist within that window and then add any pay in the short gap between the window’s end and the first day of bereavement. Pay due for work in the window counts even if it is paid later, and back‑dated rises must be treated as if they applied in the relevant weeks. Where there is no set pay day, the rules switch to the actual day of payment.

A new Regulation 19A introduces “expected normal weekly earnings” for the seven weeks after the week of the bereavement. Employers must base this on the contractual rate of pay, normal hours, representative earlier weeks, any pre‑arranged unpaid absences, and any other reasonable information. If two or more employers are treated as one on the first day of bereavement, their expected earnings are aggregated and liability for SPBP is shared in proportion to those earnings.

Where the weekly earnings threshold is met, the weekly rate of SPBP is set at 90% of the calculated figure. The regulations map out how to average across eight weeks when part of the period is actual pay and part is expected pay, always including the week of bereavement itself in the calculation. Payroll software should now accommodate these weightings; if not, finance teams will need a documented manual method that follows the regulatory formulae.

Contractual arrangements are also clarified. Where an employer pays contractual remuneration for bereavement‑related absence, SPBP can still apply and the interaction is expressly extended to cover absence “by reason of experiencing a miscarriage”. Policies and handbooks should be updated so that miscarriage is included alongside child bereavement in eligibility and pay wording.

An explicit anti‑avoidance rule raises the compliance stakes. If an employee’s contract was ended mainly to avoid paying SPBP, the former employer remains liable as if the employee had continued in employment through the week of the bereavement. That places the onus on HR and legal teams to evidence genuine business reasons for any termination where timing could otherwise be questioned.

Scope has widened for workers with cross‑border footprints. Amendments to the Persons Abroad and Mariners rules mean that, where someone is subject to UK social security and is gainfully employed in an EEA state in circumstances equivalent to employment in Northern Ireland, they are treated as an employee for SPBP. Weeks worked in an EEA state within the relevant look‑back or look‑forward periods can count towards entitlement. The miscarriage criterion is also switched on from 6 April 2026 for these cases.

For HR and payroll, the practical to‑do list starts now. Update payroll parameters for the eight‑week normal earnings test and the seven‑week expected earnings framework; build a process to capture expected earnings evidence from managers for new starters and variable‑hours staff; and brief finance on how back‑dated pay rises and late payments must be allocated to earlier weeks. Group employers should agree how liability is apportioned where employees are treated as having one employer.

Two quick examples help illustrate the mechanics. A new starter with only three paid weeks before the bereavement will have those weeks counted, plus any pay in the days between the window and the bereavement, then the calculation brings in expected earnings for the remaining weeks to create an eight‑week average. If that average is £500, the weekly SPBP due is £450 (90%). In a group scenario where an employee works across two connected employers and is treated as having one employer on the first day of bereavement, each entity’s share of liability tracks its share of the aggregated expected earnings.

These changes apply only to Northern Ireland. Different frameworks operate in England, Scotland and Wales. The Department for the Economy has published an impact assessment dated 23 February 2026; employers should also watch for HMRC guidance to align payroll software and Real Time Information coding. The bottom line: from 6 April 2026, SPBP in Northern Ireland becomes a day‑one entitlement with a more flexible, earnings‑based gateway-good for employees, and a clear compliance priority for SMEs.