The umbrella register and joint and several liability

The register

Every umbrella company an agency pays through is a record: its name, its risk status, whether it is on the preferred supplier list, and the placements running through it. An umbrella placement must name its umbrella, which means the register is complete by construction rather than by discipline.

Changes to a risk status or preferred-supplier standing are audited with what it was and what it became, because the question is not what you think of an umbrella today. It is whether you can show that you assessed it, and kept assessing it.

The evidence file

Each umbrella carries evidence: accreditations, audits, insurance, whatever the agency relies on. Items carry an expiry date where they have one. Evidence is filed as the umbrella sent it: the certificate as a PDF, the payslip sample as a photo, the policy as it came, with a note saying who assessed it, from the umbrella's own file on the compliance screen. The file lists what is on file for that umbrella, dated, with the stale items marked, beside the one door to add more; every file also appears in the agency's document library and in the evidence pack for any placement through that umbrella.

Red and amber mean two different things

Red is therefore reserved for the two states that mean there is no current assessment at all: live placements with no evidence whatsoever, or an umbrella the agency itself has marked red. Stale evidence raises an amber note naming how many items have lapsed.

What counts as enough

HMRC published no standard for what a sufficient file looks like, so the bar is the agency's own defensible position rather than a constant hidden in the code. It lives in the umbrella rule pack with its source, and it can be raised.

What the Employment Rights Act changes next

The Employment Rights Act 2025 brings umbrella companies inside the employment business regime, enforced by the Fair Work Agency. The commencement date is not yet laid, so treat any specific one you are given as provisional. The chain is already a first-class record here, so the change is a rule pack rather than a migration. The guide covers the liability itself.