Pension and HMRC Self Assessment

andyb141134

Hello All,

I am looking for some guidance if possible?

My company pension has just transferred from Aviva to Aon, with this they have changed to a 'Net Pay' system for contributions, which I was never aware of being honest or impact.

I have never claimed my for any tax relief via my self assessment and this goes back approx 7 years and checking my Aviva account never had any benefit applied in my account.

My questions are can I reclaim this full amount in my annual tax return or am I limited to a time period or is it worth speaking to HMRC directly on this? 

I'm confused by it so any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks 

Pat38493

What method were they using before?

Contrary to what the name implies, the net pay method indicates that the pension deductions are sent directly to your pension before any tax is deducted, so you don’t need to do anything.

So for the new pension you won’t need to do anything as you are getting the tax relief instantly from your pay.  For the old one, you need to tell us what method was being used previously, but if you never received any 20% tax relief to your old Aviva account, it’s likely they were using net pay before as well.

Marcon

andyb141134 said:

Hello All,

I am looking for some guidance if possible?

My company pension has just transferred from Aviva to Aon, with this they have changed to a 'Net Pay' system for contributions, which I was never aware of being honest or impact.

I have never claimed my for any tax relief via my self assessment and this goes back approx 7 years and checking my Aviva account never had any benefit applied in my account.

My questions are can I reclaim this full amount in my annual tax return or am I limited to a time period or is it worth speaking to HMRC directly on this? 

I'm confused by it so any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks 

Unless you're a higher rate taxpayer, it won't make any difference to you - you wouldn't need to claim anything - but it would make sense to check what system was used while you were contributing to the Aviva scheme.

If you were a higher rate taxpayer and the Aviva scheme was a 'relief at source' scheme (your personal contributions were paid out of your taxed salary, and the provider claims basic rate relief on your behalf and adds it to your 'pot'), then you can claim higher rate relief going back for a maximum of four tax years.

You might ask your employer if they've considered salary sacrifice, which would give both employer and employee a potential NI saving.

andyb141134

Marcon said:

andyb141134 said:

Hello All,

I am looking for some guidance if possible?

My company pension has just transferred from Aviva to Aon, with this they have changed to a 'Net Pay' system for contributions, which I was never aware of being honest or impact.

I have never claimed my for any tax relief via my self assessment and this goes back approx 7 years and checking my Aviva account never had any benefit applied in my account.

My questions are can I reclaim this full amount in my annual tax return or am I limited to a time period or is it worth speaking to HMRC directly on this? 

I'm confused by it so any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks 

Unless you're a higher rate taxpayer, it won't make any difference to you - you wouldn't need to claim anything - but it would make sense to check what system was used while you were contributing to the Aviva scheme.

If you were a higher rate taxpayer and the Aviva scheme was a 'relief at source' scheme (your personal contributions were paid out of your taxed salary, and the provider claims basic rate relief on your behalf and adds it to your 'pot'), then you can claim higher rate relief going back for a maximum of four tax years.

You might ask your employer if they've considered salary sacrifice, which would give both employer and employee a potential NI saving.

Thanks for the response, I am a higher rate tax payer, I've spoken with our payroll department they suggested I should be claiming via my annual self assessment. I wasn't sure on time limit I had though, may be worth getting an accountant to do this for me to make sure I don't miss anything

Dazed_and_C0nfused

andyb141134 said:

Marcon said:

andyb141134 said:

Hello All,

I am looking for some guidance if possible?

My company pension has just transferred from Aviva to Aon, with this they have changed to a 'Net Pay' system for contributions, which I was never aware of being honest or impact.

I have never claimed my for any tax relief via my self assessment and this goes back approx 7 years and checking my Aviva account never had any benefit applied in my account.

My questions are can I reclaim this full amount in my annual tax return or am I limited to a time period or is it worth speaking to HMRC directly on this? 

I'm confused by it so any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks 

Unless you're a higher rate taxpayer, it won't make any difference to you - you wouldn't need to claim anything - but it would make sense to check what system was used while you were contributing to the Aviva scheme.

If you were a higher rate taxpayer and the Aviva scheme was a 'relief at source' scheme (your personal contributions were paid out of your taxed salary, and the provider claims basic rate relief on your behalf and adds it to your 'pot'), then you can claim higher rate relief going back for a maximum of four tax years.

You might ask your employer if they've considered salary sacrifice, which would give both employer and employee a potential NI saving.

Thanks for the response, I am a higher rate tax payer, I've spoken with our payroll department they suggested I should be claiming via my annual self assessment. I wasn't sure on time limit I had though, may be worth getting an accountant to do this for me to make sure I don't miss anything

When it comes to the intricacies of pension tax relief I would take what your payroll department say with a pinch of salt.

And I'm not sure paying an accountant is a good use of your money, they will likely rely entirely on what you tell them (as they're accountants not necessarily personal tax/pension specialists) so why not simply do it yourself.

The first think you need to do is establish exactly what method was used to make the contributions.

Your original post makes it sound very much like net pay (or salary sacrifice although you wouldn't actually pay anything with salary sacrifice) and the beauty of net pay is you get the maximum possible tax saving each payday and never need to tell HMRC about these contributions.  They would never get entered on the pension contribution section of a tax return for example.

I have never claimed my for any tax relief via my self assessment and this goes back approx 7 years and checking my Aviva account never had any benefit applied in my account.

Until you understand the method used it is pointless doing anything else.

Pat38493

if you post the details of one of your payslips from when you were in the Aviva scheme or a P60 detail it will be obvious to the experts here how it was working.  Obviously redact any personal identity info.

Marcon

Pat38493 said:

if you post the details of one of your payslips from when you were in the Aviva scheme or a P60 detail it will be obvious to the experts here how it was working.  Obviously redact any personal identity info.

A P60 shows gross earnings, take-home pay and the NI/income tax someone has paid. In the absence of further information, that alone wouldn't necessarily enable anyone here to work out what pension contributions had been paid (if any) and whether these were net pay or relief at source.

Your suggestion of a payslip should yield the necessary information, so if OP has one of those to hand that ought to do the trick.