Common mistakes
Most Maternity Allowance problems are not about the underlying rules. They are about paperwork, dates, and timing: a missing form, a wrong window, a late claim, or a change nobody reported. This page collects the mistakes that appear again and again, so you can check your own claim against them before you post it.
1. Claiming the wrong payment
Applying for Maternity Allowance when you actually qualify for Statutory Maternity Pay wastes weeks, because the Department will direct you back to your employer. Always check the employer route first, get an SMP1 from any employer who refuses, and only then claim Maternity Allowance. The reverse mistake is also common: assuming that because one employer refused, no payment is available, when Maternity Allowance is precisely the fallback for that situation.
2. Forgetting the SMP1 form
If you were employed in the 15th week before your due week and an employer refused Statutory Maternity Pay, the SMP1 form is not optional decoration. Without it, your claim can be returned with a note telling you to ask the employer about SMP, which restarts the clock. Get the SMP1 from every employer who employed you in that week, and send it with the MA1.
3. Counting the test period from the wrong date
The 66-week test period runs back from the due date, not from the birth date, the claim date, or the date you stopped work. Counting from the wrong anchor shifts the whole window and can make qualifying weeks fall outside it. Use the GOV.UK test period calculator and write the dates on the form before you match payslips to them.
4. Assuming weeks must be consecutive or with one employer
Neither is true for Maternity Allowance. Weeks with different employers count, gaps do not erase earlier weeks, and the 13 earnings weeks need not be consecutive. Women who rule themselves out on this mistaken belief are among the most common cases of unclaimed entitlement.
5. Leaving the claim too late
You can apply from 26 weeks of pregnancy, and you should claim within three months of your start date to protect the full amount. Claims delayed beyond that window can still succeed, but weeks outside the backdating limit are lost for good. A claim posted the week after the birth is fine; a claim posted five months after the start date is not.
6. Using last year's rate
Online articles linger. A figure of £187.18 a week was the standard rate for 2025/26, not 2026/27, when the rate is £194.32. Budgeting from an old article understates your income and can lead to a needlessly tight plan. Always check the tax year and confirm the figure on GOV.UK.
7. Ignoring the self-employed top-up
Self-employed claimants who start on £27 a week sometimes accept that rate as final. It often is not. If you have paid fewer than 13 weeks of Class 2 contributions, you can usually top up after you apply, and the Department will increase and backdate your payments. Ask how many weeks you are short as soon as the decision arrives, rather than months later.
8. Not reporting changes
Returning to work, including keeping in touch days, starting a new job, becoming entitled to Statutory Maternity Pay, changing bank details or address, and moving abroad are all reportable changes. Unreported changes create overpayments, a possible £50 fine, and, in deliberate cases, a fraud investigation. Reporting is quick; repaying an overpayment is not.
Sources: GOV.UK, Maternity Allowance: how to claim, eligibility, what you will get, and report a change of circumstances; GOV.UK, Maternity benefits technical guidance.