Due date vs Paid date for contributions

YellowCarBlueCar

Hopefully an easy one to answer please…

I'm working out the maximum SIPP contribution for my wife this FY, so looking at her company pension contributions (salary sacrifice so all EEs).

The contributions have a 'Due' date, and a 'Paid' date, and for April 25 these straddle the start of the FY, with payment 'Due' 1/4/25 but 'Paid' 30/4/25.

Can someone please confirm if this payment fall into last FY when it was due, or this FY when it was actually paid please?

Thanks

wjr4

it will be the date it hits the pension.

DRS1

There is another thread here where @dunstonh says it would be the payroll date (ie when the salary is paid I think)

Workplace pension and tax year of contributions — MoneySavingExpert Forum

dunstonh

There is another thread here where @dunstonh says it would be the payroll date (ie when the salary is paid I think)

To be fair, there is a nuance with the method and history, and I didn't include that. So, I have pulled the other post and gone more complete here.

For a net pay scheme, HMRC treat the contribution as paid on the date it is deducted from the employee’s pay, i.e. the payroll date within that pension input period. This is an explicit exception in PTM053200: for net pay money purchase arrangements, the “date of payment” for the annual allowance test is the deduction date, not when the scheme actually receives the money.​

For a salary sacrifice scheme, the sacrificed amount is treated as an employer contribution, so HMRC look at when the contribution is actually paid into the pension scheme, i.e. the date the provider receives the money during the pension input period. In practice, that means if payroll runs on 31 March but the salary sacrifice employer contribution hits the provider on 7 April, it will normally count against the new tax year’s annual allowance, even though the sacrifice is shown on the March payslip.

There are also cases where a notional date can be used with some long-standing schemes. The key with those is consistency. i.e. if it started using the payroll date, it cannot later switch to the payment date.

https://www.gov.uk/hmrc-internal-manuals/pensions-tax-manual/ptm053200

YellowCarBlueCar

Thanks for the in-depth replies, there seems to be a lot of conflicting information from a Google search, presumably because of the difference between contribution type.

It sounds as though I'll need to consider the April payment in this FY.

DRS1

If the payment was in 2025 can't you just ask the pension provider what year they treat it as falling in? Maybe ask for an annual allowance statement for 24/5?

retiringin26

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81911948#Comment_81911948

USS is one of those edge cases.

AVCs into Investment Builder which are credited in month N (around the 10th of the month) are treated as being from month N-1 by agreement with HMRC.

So March salary deductions count in the tax year month 12 for AA purposes, despite being credited by USS in April.