Employing under-18s: what the rules actually are

Shops, cafés, salons, garages and building firms have always run partly on teenagers, and most of the owners doing it have never read the rules. That is understandable — the rules are split across three different pieces of law and a set of local council byelaws that vary by area. It is also risky, because the part that bites hardest is the part almost nobody knows exists.

The single most useful thing to understand is that there is not one set of rules for under-18s. There are two, and the dividing line is not a birthday. It is whether the young person is still of compulsory school age.

Two regimes, not one

A child, in employment law, is someone below compulsory school leaving age. In England that ends on the last Friday in June of the school year in which they turn 16. Children are governed by the Children and Young Persons Act 1933 and by local authority byelaws, which differ from council to council. They are not entitled to the National Minimum Wage and they sit outside the young-worker provisions of the Working Time Regulations.

A young worker is someone over compulsory school age but under 18. They get the National Minimum Wage, they get the Working Time Regulations with a specially protective set of limits, and they are employees or workers in the ordinary sense.

Get the category wrong and you apply the wrong rulebook entirely. A 15-year-old and a 16-year-old doing the same Saturday shift in the same shop are covered by completely different law.

The dangerous hire is not the 17-year-old. It is the 14-year-old you took on without checking whether your council requires a permit.

If they are still of compulsory school age

Children can generally work from 14, though some council byelaws allow light work from 13. Under 14 requires a performance licence and is limited to television, theatre and modelling.

The hours are tightly capped. During term time, a maximum of 12 hours a week: two hours on a school day, two hours on a Sunday, and a maximum of five hours on a Saturday for 13 and 14-year-olds or eight hours for 15 and 16-year-olds. During school holidays, 25 hours a week for 13 and 14-year-olds and 35 hours for 15 and 16-year-olds, on the same daily pattern.

No work before 7am or after 7pm, at all. No more than one hour before school unless local byelaws specifically permit it. A break of at least one hour after four hours of work. And every child must have two consecutive weeks free of work during the school holidays in each calendar year.

You may also need an employment permit from the local council, depending on their byelaws. Many councils require one for every child they employ, and the permit is what triggers their check that the job is suitable. It is free, it takes a form, and doing without it is the most common breach in retail and hospitality.

The catch-all condition sits over all of it: a child cannot do any work that may be harmful to their health, wellbeing or education. That is what rules out most industrial settings, machinery, and late finishes before a school day.

If they have left school but are under 18

Now the Working Time Regulations apply, in their young-worker form, and the limits are stricter than for adults rather than looser.

A young worker cannot work more than eight hours a day or 40 hours a week. There is no opt-out — the 48-hour opt-out that adults can sign does not exist for under-18s, which surprises employers who assume the same paperwork covers everyone. The wider adult regime is covered in the 48-hour week and rest break rules; this is the tighter version of it.

Rest is prescriptive. A 30-minute break if they work more than four and a half hours at a stretch. Twelve hours' rest in each 24-hour period. Forty-eight hours' rest each week, taken together where possible.

Night work is restricted between 10pm and 6am, or between 11pm and 7am if the contract permits working after 10pm. Under-18s cannot work between midnight and 4am in any circumstances. There are narrow sector exceptions allowing work up to midnight or from 4am — in catering, hotels, pubs and restaurants, retail, agriculture, bakeries, hospitals, newspaper and postal deliveries and advertising — but only where no adult is available to do the work and it will not harm their education or training.

Holiday accrues normally: 5.6 weeks a year, pro rata for part-timers, from day one. The mechanics are the same as for anyone else and are set out in how much holiday staff are entitled to.

What you actually pay

From 1 April 2026 the National Minimum Wage for under-18s and for apprentices in the first year of an apprenticeship is £8.00 an hour. For comparison, the 18 to 20 rate is £10.85, and the National Living Wage for 21 and over is £12.71.

Two things trip employers up. First, apprentices aged 19 or over who have completed the first year of their apprenticeship move onto the normal rate for their age — that transition is a date in your diary, not something payroll notices on its own, and it is one of several traps set out in minimum wage traps for small employers. Second, the moment a young worker crosses a birthday the rate changes from the start of the next pay reference period.

There is a genuine saving on the employer's side. Employer National Insurance is charged at 0% for employees under 21 on earnings up to the Upper Secondary Threshold of £50,270, rather than the standard 15% above the £5,000 secondary threshold. For a full-time young employee that is worth several thousand pounds a year, and it applies to anyone under 21, not only under-18s.

Pensions work by age too. Automatic enrolment applies to workers aged 22 up to State Pension age earning over the £10,000 trigger, so a 17-year-old is not automatically enrolled. But a young worker aged 16 or over earning above £6,240 has the right to opt in, and if they do, you have to contribute. That right is easy to forget and expensive to backdate — the fuller picture is in what happens to your workplace pension when you hire.

The risk assessment you have to do first

This is the compliance step most small employers skip, and it is a legal duty rather than good practice.

Regulation 19 of the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999 requires you to assess the risks to a young person before they start, taking specific account of their inexperience, lack of awareness of risk and immaturity, and to supervise them proportionately. Certain work is off limits to them altogether where it is beyond their physical or psychological capacity.

And regulation 10(2) adds the bit almost nobody does: before employing a child, you must give a parent of that child comprehensible and relevant information on the risks identified by the assessment and the preventive and protective measures you have put in place. Not a chat at the door — information, provided to the parent, before the child starts. It is the cheapest possible piece of compliance and the one an inspector will ask for first. If your general arrangements need work, start with what a small employer must actually do on health and safety.

A worked example: the Saturday assistant who becomes a summer full-timer

Illustrative, but the numbers and limits are the real ones.

You take on a 15-year-old as a Saturday shop assistant. She is of compulsory school age, so: eight hours maximum on a Saturday, nothing before 7am or after 7pm, an hour's break after four hours, no National Minimum Wage entitlement, an employment permit if your council requires one, a risk assessment before she starts, and that assessment shared with a parent. You pay her £8.00 an hour anyway because paying a child less than the under-18 rate is a recruitment problem even where it is not a legal one.

She turns 16 in May and leaves school on the last Friday in June. From that Monday everything changes. She is now a young worker: entitled to £8.00 an hour as a matter of law, capped at eight hours a day and 40 hours a week with no opt-out available, a 30-minute break after four and a half hours, no work between 10pm and 6am, and 5.6 weeks of holiday accruing.

Run the summer full-time cost. Forty hours at £8.00 is £320 a week. Employer National Insurance is nil, because she is under 21 and nowhere near £50,270. Total weekly cost: £320.

The same 40 hours filled by a 21-year-old at £12.71 is £508.40 in wages. Employer NI at 15% on earnings above the £5,000 annual secondary threshold — about £96.15 a week — adds £61.84. Total weekly cost: £570.24.

That is £250 a week of difference, or roughly £13,000 over a year, for the same hours. It is a real reason to build young people into your staffing plan, and a real reason to get the rules right before you do — the same logic that makes taking on an apprentice cheaper than most owners assume.

The five-minute checklist

Establish whether they are above or below compulsory school age, and write the answer down. Call your local council and ask whether an employment permit is required and what their byelaws say about hours — the answer varies by area and takes one phone call. Do the young-person risk assessment before the first shift, and give a parent the findings if they are still of school age. Set the correct minimum wage rate and diarise their next birthday. Configure payroll for the under-21 National Insurance category. Build the rota to the eight-hour, 40-hour, no-night-work limits rather than assuming adult rules with a bit of care applied.

None of that takes an afternoon. Getting it wrong — an unpermitted child, a 16-year-old rostered until 11pm, a missing risk assessment after an accident — is a different kind of day entirely.

Common questions

What age can someone legally start working in the UK?

Children can generally take part-time work from age 14, and some local council byelaws allow light work from 13. Below 13 the only permitted work is television, theatre and modelling under a performance licence. Full-time work is only allowed once someone has reached compulsory school leaving age, which in England is the last Friday in June of the school year in which they turn 16, and is capped at 40 hours a week until they turn 18. Because the detailed rules on permitted jobs and hours sit in local authority byelaws rather than national law, the practical answer depends on your council — one phone call settles it.

Do I have to pay the minimum wage to a 15-year-old?

No. The National Minimum Wage does not apply to anyone below compulsory school leaving age, so a 15-year-old working Saturdays in term time has no statutory wage entitlement. Once they pass school leaving age, the under-18 rate applies, which from 1 April 2026 is £8.00 an hour. That same £8.00 rate covers apprentices in the first year of an apprenticeship. The 18 to 20 rate is £10.85 and the National Living Wage for 21 and over is £12.71. In practice most employers pay school-age staff the under-18 rate regardless, because paying less is a retention problem even where it is lawful.

How many hours can a 16 or 17-year-old work?

A maximum of eight hours a day and 40 hours a week. Unlike adults, under-18s cannot sign an opt-out, so those limits are absolute rather than a default. They are entitled to a 30-minute break if they work more than four and a half hours at a stretch, twelve hours' rest in every 24-hour period, and 48 hours' rest each week taken together where possible. Night work is restricted between 10pm and 6am, or 11pm to 7am if the contract permits working after 10pm, and no one under 18 may work between midnight and 4am. Narrow exceptions exist in hospitality, retail and a few other sectors.

Do I need a permit or a risk assessment to employ a school-age child?

Often both. Many local authorities require an employment permit for every child they employ, and the permit application is what triggers the council's check that the job and hours are suitable — it is free, and working without one is a common breach in retail and hospitality. Separately, regulation 19 of the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999 requires a risk assessment before a young person starts, taking account of their inexperience and immaturity. Regulation 10(2) then requires you to give a parent of the child comprehensible information on the risks identified and the control measures you have put in place, before employment begins.

AD Solicitors, a separate SRA-regulated law firm, has a guide to employment law for small employers.