How to account for pension contributions on SA - combination of employment and self employment

sghughes42

For the first time my combined salaried and self employed income has pushed me over the 40% threshold for the year. I have been paying in to a workplace pension, but I have no idea how to fill in the self assessment to reflect this - the guidance isn't that clear, especially for my situation.

For the first half of the period I was in a pension scheme that used salary sacrifice, then I was made redundant and moved to another job where contributions were taken after tax had been deducted.

Firstly, I'm not clear if I can claim relief for both, or only the latter?

What figures do I use to calculate what I've paid, especially as one lot if before tax and the other after?

Hopefully next year will be easier with just one pension scheme to deal with! Never expected to even be in this situation! TIA

zagfles

Forget salary sacrifice contributions, you've already had "tax relief" by sacrificing the salary and so not paying tax on it!

For the pension taken after tax, the pension scheme claims basic rate relief (you'll see this on the pension statements), you enter the gross payments (ie your actual payments plus the tax relief claimed by the scheme) in the first box for pension tax relief (relief at source).

Dazed_and_C0nfused

There is no pension tax relief with salary sacrifice.  These are employer contributions, you weren't actually contributing to the pension.  As such you don't enter anything on a tax return in relation to the salary you sacrificed.  

For the second scheme were these definitely "relief at source" contributions i.e. you contribute £100 and the pension company added 25% making a gross contribution of £125?

sghughes42

Thanks, both, it hit me just after posting that of course I can't get tax relief on something that wasn't taxed in the first place...

Is it just payments made during the financial year, or are they averaged out at all? In that our pay date is the 24th, so do I just go up to 24th March, or do I count part of the April contribution also?

I'll double check it is a relief at source pension, but I did read all auto-enrollment pensions are that type. My payslip shows Employee and Employer contributions.

Dazed_and_C0nfused

Most are relief at source but the odd one is net pay (similar to salary sacrifice but you pay the contribution and before tax and there is no NI saving).

You just need to look at the date the payment was made so
Payday 24 March 2021 = 100% in 2020:21
Payday 24 April 2021 = 100% in 2021:22

zagfles

Dazed_and_C0nfused said:

Most are relief at source but the odd one is net pay (similar to salary sacrifice but you pay the contribution and before tax and there is no NI saving).

You just need to look at the date the payment was made so
Payday 24 March 2021 = 100% in 2020:21
Payday 24 April 2021 = 100% in 2021:22

For RAS it's not paydays, it's the date the payment is made to the pension, which may be later. See https://www.gov.uk/hmrc-internal-manuals/pensions-tax-manual/ptm041000#IDA0QUFG

However the tax relief goes with the payment date even if  the tax relief isn't paid till the next tax year!

OP check your pension statement, it should say what your gross contributions for the tax year are, it should be 1.25 * your net contributions in the tax year (don't include employer contributions).

sghughes42

It's a Scottish Widows pension, their statement is pretty clear. Date it later than pay day but was still before 5th April. It lists my contribution, basic rate tax relief and employer contribution separately so easy enough to work out from that, thanks both for the help.