Need help understanding P60 for tax return

icicat

Hi all,

Something I've been really confused when filling in a tax return is the question: Pay from this employment – the total from your P45 or P60 – before tax was taken off

My company accountant said to just put the amount shown in the left box (Pay) and to ignore the amount deducted for tax in the right box (Tax Deducted)

Though as the question states it says before tax was deducted? So am I correct in thinking it means I need to take the pay amount in the left box which I am assuming is net pay and add the tax deducted on the right box to get the correct amount before tax? here is a picture for example:

westy22

No.

£33,600.00 is your Gross Pay for the year (which goes in Box 1)
£4,204.00 is the tax you had deducted from that Gross Pay (which goes in Box 2)

Dazed_and_C0nfused

icicat said:

Hi all,

Something I've been really confused when filling in a tax return is the question: Pay from this employment – the total from your P45 or P60 – before tax was taken off

My company accountant said to just put the amount shown in the left box (Pay) and to ignore the amount deducted for tax in the right box (Tax Deducted)

Though as the question states it says before tax was deducted? So am I correct in thinking it means I need to take the pay amount in the left box which I am assuming is net pay and add the tax deducted on the right box to get the correct amount before tax? here is a picture for example:

No, no, no!

You are massively overcomplicating things.

You copy the pay figure into the relevant box on your return. 

You don't ignore the tax figure, you also copy that figure into the relevant box on your return.

Why do you think the £33,600 is after tax was deducted?  Do you believe your P60 is factually incorrect?  Have you worked through your payslips for that tax year?

icicat

Thanks for the replies. So to put it simple, is this how you would fill the form based on the P60 above?

icicat

@westy22Yeah that's what I've been told, so have been doing it for years like that. Though what dawned on me is that this amount seems less then what I thought I earned, and when I added the tax deducted amount to this it looked more like what I thought my gross pay amount was, which is what I thought the question is asking. This is where the confusion is coming from.

chrisbur

The figure on your P60 is your taxable gross pay and that is the figure HMRC require.  You may have a higher gross pay from which some items have been deducted as they are not taxable to give your taxable gross pay.  The most common item is some but not all pension contributions.

icicat

chrisbur said:

The figure on your P60 is your taxable gross pay and that is the figure HMRC require.  You may have a higher gross pay from which some items have been deducted as they are not taxable to give your taxable gross pay.  The most common item is some but not all pension contributions.

I think you hit the nail on the head! Yes that's probably why I was getting confused as I do pay high pension contributions. For me I thought gross pay is pretty much the figure I see on my pay-rise letter lol. Nice one! Thanks all.