National minimum wage

In the first six months of the operation of the National Minimum Wage (NMW), the new NMW Helpline has dealt with around 90,000 calls. There have also been more than 3,000 formal complaints about workers being paid at less than the minimum. These led to visits by enforcement officers in about half the cases. However there had been just 20 enforcement notices issued to the end of October 1999 and no penalty notices.