In my experience of supporting payroll customers, week 53 is a bit of a strange phenomenon. Those people who have one, don’t want one, and some people who haven’t got one, actually want one “because my friend has one”!

The simple reason we even have a week 53 is because the number of days in the tax year doesn’t divide into a whole number of tax weeks. The remaining day, or days in the event of a leap year, is known as week 53.

The main thing to remember is that week 53 doesn’t really affect your payroll. Over the year, your employees still receive the correct amount, and if you use Sage 50 or Instant Payroll, the tax and NI automatically calculates correctly. All you need to do is set your process or pay date and then pay your employees as normal.

You can find out if you have a week 53 using our quick flow-chart in your online guide to payroll year end.