Possibly urgent tax year end and pension question

boots_babe

Hi,

I have paid in extra to my pension, using up my allowance of carry forward from previous years, using carry forward dating back to 2020/2021 tax year. Some of this carry forward was paid in during the current tax year (May 2024) and some during the previous tax year (March 2024).

I had planned to call up HMRC to get the additional tax back (40% taxpayer) which is a process I have used before. But I have not gotten around to it yet.

Just had a thought, do I need to claim back the additional tax before end of 31st Jan (today)?

My understanding is that although the additional payments are allowed to be tax free due to the carry forward allowance which dates from previous tax years, the payment itself is NOT allocated retrospectively to those previous tax years. Therefore any tax treatment / higher rate tax refund would be done as part of the current tax year? In which case today's deadline is irrelevant.

Thanks.

TheGreenFrog

Well yes you are correct.

zagfles

You need to put March 2024 conts on the 2023/24 tax return. You've got a few hours. Good luck.  

Dazed_and_C0nfused

boots_babe said:

Hi,

I have paid in extra to my pension, using up my allowance of carry forward from previous years, using carry forward dating back to 2020/2021 tax year. Some of this carry forward was paid in during the current tax year (May 2024) and some during the previous tax year (March 2024).

I had planned to call up HMRC to get the additional tax back (40% taxpayer) which is a process I have used before. But I have not gotten around to it yet.

Just had a thought, do I need to claim back the additional tax before end of 31st Jan (today)?

My understanding is that although the additional payments are allowed to be tax free due to the carry forward allowance which dates from previous tax years, the payment itself is NOT allocated retrospectively to those previous tax years. Therefore any tax treatment / higher rate tax refund would be done as part of the current tax year? In which case today's deadline is irrelevant.

Thanks.

You can only ever get tax relief for the tax year you paid the contribution in.

Carry forward of unused annual allowance simply allows you to pay more in the later year, you don't get tax relief for the tax year you are carrying forward unused annual allowance from.

Are you required to file a tax return? 

Have you been issued with a return, or notice to file a return, for 2023-24?  If you haven't then the deadline of 31 January isn't relevant.

Marcon

zagfles said:

You need to put March 2024 conts on the 2023/24 tax return. You've got a few hours. Good luck.  

You can't alter the tax year in which the contributions were paid, but you can make backdated claims for higher rate tax relief on your pension contributions for the past four tax years.

boots_babe

Thanks for confirming that my understanding was correct, a last minute panic!