PAYE Reconciliations

If most of your income is taxed under PAYE (Pay As You Earn) you may soon receive a reconciliation of the income tax you have paid compared to the amount that was due to be paid for 2013/14. This calculation arrives on a form P800, which should be checked very carefully for errors and omissions. If mistakes are missed they can be carried forward for several years, resulting in escalating amounts of tax over or under-paid.

For example the High Income Child Benefit Charge (HICBC) may be due where you earn over £50,000 and your family receives child benefit. But the HICBC will not be reflected in the P800 calculation, as HMRC can't accurately match child benefit claimants with the high earners in those families. If you believe you are due to pay the HICBC to claw-back the child benefit received, you need to register for a self-assessment and complete a tax return. We can help you with that.

Other common errors on the P800 arise from the changing value of taxable benefits, varying pension contributions, and estimated amounts of other income included in your PAYE code such as rents or interest.

If you have paid the right amount of tax under PAYE for 2013/14 you won't receive a communication from HMRC. If you have overpaid tax you should receive a cheque from HMRC within two weeks of the issue of the P800. Don't respond to emails promising a tax repayment - those are scams.

If the P800 shows you owe tax, that amount will normally be collected through your PAYE code for 2015/16. We can help you challenge the calculation if you think it's wrong, but we will need to see the P800 you have received, as HMRC don't send us a copy.

Salary and Dividend Strategy 2014/15

As a director and shareholder of your own company you can decide how much salary to pay yourself each month in order to use your tax-free personal allowance in the most tax efficient way. Any further funds you need can be extracted as a dividend if the company is making a profit.

If you are a director of your company and you don't have a contract that sets out terms of employment with the company, you don't have to pay yourself the national minimum wage. So how much should you pay yourself?

For 2014/15 if you were born after 5 April 1948 you have a tax free personal allowance of £833 per month (£10,000 per year). You could take a salary at that level and pay no income tax, assuming you have no other taxable benefits from the company such as a car.

However, you will pay national insurance (NICs) on that salary as the NICs threshold is only £663 per month. From a gross salary of £833 the company must deduct NI of £20.40 and set-aside employer's NI of £23.46 on top. The company will have an employment allowance of £2,000 for the year to set against its employer's NI due on all its employees, so it won't have to pay over employer's NI until that £2000 is used up.

If you take a salary of just above the NI lower earnings threshold of £481 per month, you will get an NI credit towards your state pension, but you don't pay any tax or NI. However, at that annual salary level (£5,772) you will be "wasting" £4,228 of your tax free personal allowance, unless you have other income to cover it.

Talk to us about the best salary level for you, which takes into account all your other sources of income.