NI employer contributions increase prompts surge in automated warehouse technology interest
07 May 2025
Toyota Material Handling reported a surge in enquiries for its range of automated and robotic warehouse solutions since the increase in National Insurance employer contributions was announced in the UK Government’s budget statement last Autumn.
The hike in the rate at which NI contributions are paid – from 13.8 percent to 15 percent – combined with a lower threshold after which employers start paying NI on an employee’s salary, has added considerably to the wage bill of most companies.
Indeed, it is estimated that for each individual forklift truck driver employed on an annual salary of around £23,400 (a UK lift truck operator’s average yearly earnings according to talent.com) the NI changes will add in the region of £800 per operator, per year, to a company’s staff costs.
“With the prevailing shortage of warehouse workers already driving wage competition, interest in automated systems was high before the budget, but since the increase in NI costs announced by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the number of ‘serious’ requests we’ve been getting for information about automation and robotics has increased significantly,” said Toyota’s Paul Freeman, Head of Business Development.
Freeman continued, “By effectively making it more difficult and costly to recruit warehouse personnel, the Chancellor of the Exchequer has accelerated the trend for companies in all sectors to introduce automated and robotic solutions as a way of mitigating the impact of the high cost of labour on operating overheads.”
According to Freeman, companies are particularly keen to explore the role that driverless forklift truck technology – such as Toyota’s Autopilot series – could play in their intralogistics processes.
“Transforming traditional lift trucks into automated guided vehicles (AGVs) eliminates reliance on forklift operators, while the technology also delivers notable reductions in product and building infrastructure damage, as well as increases in productivity and throughput rates,” explained Freeman.
“Logistics services companies were already starting to transition away from their traditional reliance on people to a more automated approach, but since the budget the pace of change appears to have rapidly increased,” he added.
More information on Toyota's range of automated storage and handling solutions here.
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