The Salary Calculator

April 2019 tax rates

The Salary Calculator has been updated with the tax rates which will take effect from 6th April 2019. There is a significant increase in the tax-free Personal Allowance from £11,850 to £12,500 per year, and outside of Scotland the threshold from 20% basic rate to 40% higher rate income tax has been increased to £50,000. Scottish tax thresholds are different from the rest of the UK, current information suggests that they will not increase as much as the UK rates will.

There have also been increases in the thresholds for Plan 1 and Plan 2 Student Loan repayments, so those paying off their loans will find their repayments lowered in the new year.

You can try out the April 2019 tax rates for yourself by choosing “2019 / 20” in the Tax Year drop-down on The Salary Calculator. You can also see a side-by-side comparison of 2018 and 2019 with the 2018 and 2019 income tax comparison page.

The calculator has been updated with the best information currently available – if any of the details change before the start of the tax year the calculator will be updated to reflect those changes.

Tags: 2019, April 2019, budget, income tax, national insurance, Pay As You Earn, pension, personal allowance, student loan, student loans, tax rates, The Salary Calculator

April 2018 tax rates

The Salary Calculator has been updated, and the new tax information which takes effect from 6th April 2018 has been applied. The personal allowance has been increased from £11,500 to £11,850, meaning you can earn an extra £350 tax-free per year. The thresholds between tax bands have also been increased.

In Scotland, new tax bands have been introduced, making income tax calculations quite different from in the rest of the UK. There are 5 tax rates, 19%, 20%, 21%, 41% and 46%, compared to just three in the rest of the UK (20%, 40% and 45%). The result of this difference is that lower earners North of the border can save as much as £20 per year compared to the rest of the UK, but with higher earners potentially paying quite a bit more in Scotland than they would if they were based elsewhere in the UK. The point at which Scottish earners go from paying less to paying more tax is a salary of about £26,000.

You can try out the April 2018 tax rates for yourself by choosing “2018 / 19” in the Tax Year drop-down on The Salary Calculator. You can also see a side-by-side comparison of 2017 and 2018 with the 2017 and 2018 income tax comparison page.

Tags: 2018, April 2018, budget, HMRC, income tax, national insurance, Pay As You Earn, personal allowance, tax rates, The Salary Calculator

New – Election Calculator 2017

With a General Election on the way, The Salary Calculator’s Election Calculator has been updated with the latest campaign proposals from the main parties. This allows you to see an estimate of how the different parties’ policies might affect you if they come to power. Right now, only the 3 parties Conservative, Labour and Liberal Democrats have produced their manifestos with details of their taxation plans. When other parties such as The Green Party and UKIP reveal their plans, the calculator will be updated.

As explained on the Election Calculator itself, this is a simplified version of The Salary Calculator, and some estimates and assumptions have had to be made. Also, of course, income tax and National Insurance are only some of the ways that governments can raise revenue, and other policy proposals may affect your financial situation. With that in mind, check out the 2017 Election Calculator.

Tags: 2017, election, general election, income tax, national insurance, Pay As You Earn, personal allowance, tax rates, The Salary Calculator

Budget 2016

Tomorrow, the Chancellor of the Exchequer will deliver his annual budget to the Houses of Parliament. We have already heard about some possible announcements (such as the introduction of a scheme to help people increase their savings), and we have been told that there will be no changes to pension tax relief (which looked likely, for a while).

From 6th April, the new tax year means changes to tax-free personal allowances, tax thresholds and the like. The Salary Calculator has been updated with the latest values so you can see what your payslip will look like from April onwards. The personal allowance has been increased to £11,000 per year, which will reduce the tax due for most people. There are changes to National Insurance this year, too – since it is no longer possible for a pension to be “contracted-out” (earning a reduction in NI contributions), those of you who had one of these pensions will be paying the full NI contributions from 6th April.

If you would like to see how these changes will affect you, head over to The Salary Calculator to see what difference it will make to your payslip!

Tags: April 2016, budget, income tax, national insurance, Pay As You Earn, pension, Pensions, personal allowance, tax rates, The Salary Calculator

General Election Salary Calculator

As you may have noticed, there’s a General Election next month and the parties are all out campaigning. Since a major campaign point this time is personal taxation, I thought it would be interesting to compare how the main parties’ policies would affect take-home pay. You can try out the Election Salary Calculator here. This is a simplified version of the normal Salary Calculator, but if you enter your salary and a few other optional extras, it will estimate the differences in deductions for the 5 main national parties.

This is just an estimate, and not all of the details are available yet – I will update the calculator with more information as the parties provide it. I hope you find it interesting! Details of the changes are described below the results table. The BBC has a very good article explaining the parties’ positions on taxation and other policy areas.

Tags: 2015, election, income tax, national insurance, Pay As You Earn, personal allowance, tax rates, The Salary Calculator