How long should you retain wage slips?

birdofafeather

Having lost these before and having to go through the messy, annoying process of recovering income statements from the ever-friendly folks at HMRC, I'm interested in how long people think you should retain wage slips from employment?

Should you just keep them to the end of the tax year?
Should you keep them for six years?
Should you keep them until you retire in case you need to prove pension eligibility?

Swoosh84

Think 6 years would be enough, depending on circumstances some things like benefit claims can be backdated beyond 6 years though. 

Personally, I've got all mine from the last 10 odd years. Got them all saved on Google Drive for easy access. Don't intend to stop saving them. Never know when they come in handy.

J

AskAsk

i tend to keep the last 6 months but probably best to keep the last 12 months.  you certainly need them from the last P60.

i know a lot of people don't even keep them at all.

pogofish

It’s not a matter of thought - the guidance issued by HMRC is quite clear. The 5/6 year thing was ended years ago!

TELLIT01

pogofish said:

It’s not a matter of thought - the guidance issued by HMRC is quite clear. The 5/6 year thing was ended years ago!

Can you provide a link to the clear HMRC guidance?

getmore4less

I have kept all mine(back to summer jobs in school) they don't take up a lot of room, most are in a single box file. with the last job in a ring binder.
Might get round to scanning one day.

theoretica

Colleague was very glad he still had his from 30 years before when the company messed up his pension.  But he could have proved this without keeping every single one.

birdofafeather

TELLIT01 said:

pogofish said:

It’s not a matter of thought - the guidance issued by HMRC is quite clear. The 5/6 year thing was ended years ago!

Can you provide a link to the clear HMRC guidance?

https://www.gov.uk/keeping-your-pay-tax-records/how-long-to-keep-your-records

Apparently it's 22 months after the end of the tax year they relate to. 

So keep your 2020/21 payslips until January 2023

[Deleted User]

Sorry to hijack the thread, and I do t wish to derail it, but I've always wondered, why do you even need them?

In circa 25 years of working, I can't recall ever needing to show mine to anybody. Even when I applied for my mortgage, they just wanted to look at my banking history, and see a reference confirming I was still employed. There must be a reason to keep them, but I've not encountered it yet. 

polkasquares

Beardybaldy said:

Sorry to hijack the thread, and I do t wish to derail it, but I've always wondered, why do you even need them?

In circa 25 years of working, I can't recall ever needing to show mine to anybody. Even when I applied for my mortgage, they just wanted to look at my banking history, and see a reference confirming I was still employed. There must be a reason to keep them, but I've not encountered it yet. 

I'm surprised you were not asked to supply your payslips when applying for a mortgage as I know most if not all would need to see them because they need to see proof of your income before they can offer you a mortgage.

[Deleted User]

polkasquares said:

Beardybaldy said:

Sorry to hijack the thread, and I do t wish to derail it, but I've always wondered, why do you even need them?

In circa 25 years of working, I can't recall ever needing to show mine to anybody. Even when I applied for my mortgage, they just wanted to look at my banking history, and see a reference confirming I was still employed. There must be a reason to keep them, but I've not encountered it yet. 

I'm surprised you were not asked to supply your payslips when applying for a mortgage as I know most if not all would need to see them because they need to see proof of your income before they can offer you a mortgage.

It might be because I got my mortgage from the same building society that I have my current account with, so they had full visibility of my income.

But it gets more interesting. I was on notice of redundancy when I applied, and I told them that, but I had another job lined up that I had yet to start. They were more concerned with my employability than my current position.

The only time I recall needing anything resembling a payslip was when I went freelance for a period of time, and needed to reference my p60 when completing my tax return.