Does it pay to get married??

wendyjb

I'm getting married very soon, Saturday in fact, and my MIL2B has just had an email from an old friend commenting that as we're having an April wedding we'll be beating the taxman.

What does he mean? Can we claim extra allowance, or is he harking back to the good old days. I thought the married man's allowance had been done away with, and there was little financial benefit to be had from the taxman nowadays for married couples.

BTW we both work full time.

Any advice gratefull received.

Tesscha

Hi Wendyjb

Congrats on your pending wedding, I'll actually be celebrating my first wedding anniversary on 30th April (so I know how you're feeling and how hectic things must be).....well unfortuately marriage tax allowance only applies to those over 65. They've done away with this and replaced it with Children's tax credits, working tax credits etc.

I hope that helps!

Let me know how your wedding goes. :-)

exil

Probably just a joke.

The married allowance was worth about 30% of the personal allowance in the early 70s, when child tax allowances still existed. Denis Healey increased it to about
55% of the personal allowance. From 1990 it was gradually reduced by successive chancellors and finally abolished.

The "second person" element of the tax credit is the equivalent - but it is available
if you are in the same household, you don't have to be married.

A married allowance introduced at the same level as in 1990 would be worth
about £2,750 - ie would reduce your tax by about £600 a year if you were
a standard rate taxpayer, £1,100 if a higher rate taxpayer. However it's unlikely any chancellor would do this (at a cost of about £15 billion) without taking something away by reducing tax credits.

wendyjb

Thanks for the info.

We think that the person that made the comment is just way behind the times, they emigrated to Australia about 25 years ago, so probably not kept up with British politics.

bunking_off

He's behind the times.

However, there are tax advantages if you're intending to die in the near future (!) because of the way that assets pass between spouses on death, and it's also useful if you've got some assets (e.g. shares) to sell and could have a capital gains tax liability, as you can transfer assets between yourselves free of tax and defacto get 2 allowances. Otherwise, pretty much all the benefits have been stolen over the years.

yesbutnobut

wendyjb wrote:

I'm getting married very soon, Saturday in fact, and my MIL2B has just had an email from an old friend commenting that as we're having an April wedding we'll be beating the taxman.

What does he mean? Can we claim extra allowance, or is he harking back to the good old days. I thought the married man's allowance had been done away with, and there was little financial benefit to be had from the taxman nowadays for married couples.

BTW we both work full time.

Any advice gratefull received.

Congratulations wendyjb.

One thing to note is that any savings should be held by the spouse who pays the lowest rate of tax. A higher rate rate payer will pay 40% tax on any interest earned, a person earning less than £5,035 p.a. (including any interest) should not pay any tax on interest earned.

tina68

it's always a good thing to get married just think of all those gifts, i divorced mine and 2 days later he died so i missed out on alot of things and so did my son..
good luck with 2morrow x

Aark

well unfortuately marriage tax allowance only applies to those over 65

It actually applies to those over 65 by 6 April 2000, i.e. born before 6 April 1935. Therefore, you now need to be 71 to qualify.

However, from 2005/06 it is also available to civil partners of the appropriate age.

margaretclare

Aark wrote:

It actually applies to those over 65 by 6 April 2000, i.e. born before 6 April 1935. Therefore, you now need to be 71 to qualify.

Yes, that's right. We got married in January 2002, my DH was born in December 1934, we got the married people's allowance and we split it between us - set it against both our pensions.

Going back a long way, it used to be advantageous to get married around April time because (I think) you then got the married people's allowance for 2 years, not just one.

Margaret Clare