JobsPlus is a new employer incentive which encourages and rewards employers who offer employment opportunities to the long-term unemployed. This incentive replaced the employer Job PRSI Exemption Scheme and the Revenue Job Assist from 1st July 2013. Regular cash payments are made to qualifying employers to offset wage costs when they engage jobseekers from the Live Register.
The incentive provides two levels of payment:
- a payment of €7,500 over two years to an employer for persons recruited who have been unemployed for between 12 and 24 months; and
- a payment of €10,000 over two years to an employer who recruits a person who has been two years or more on the Live Register.
As of 21st February 2014, a total of 2,820 employers have registered to check their eligibility. Of these, 2,687 have been approved, while 57 employers have been rejected. The main reason for rejection is that they do not hold a valid tax clearance cert.
Up to the same date, 6,128 jobseekers have applied to check their eligibility. Of these 4,728 are eligible while 1,182 do not satisfy the conditions for the incentive.
Payments for the JobsPlus scheme will issue to 1,231 employers in respect of 1,589 employees on Friday, 28th February 2014. A breakdown of these payments by county is shown in the table below.
TABLE
County
|
Number of employees for whom payments are being made
|
Dublin
|
451
|
Cork
|
149
|
Waterford
|
92
|
Kildare
|
73
|
Galway
|
68
|
Donegal
|
66
|
Wicklow
|
62
|
Tipperary
|
60
|
Kerry
|
52
|
Limerick
|
52
|
Louth
|
51
|
Wexford
|
50
|
Meath
|
41
|
Westmeath
|
36
|
Mayo
|
35
|
Kilkenny
|
31
|
Carlow
|
29
|
Monaghan
|
29
|
Laois
|
28
|
Longford
|
28
|
Clare
|
26
|
Cavan
|
23
|
Sligo
|
23
|
Offaly
|
16
|
Roscommon
|
11
|
Leitrim
|
7
|
Total
|
1,589
|