Going from monthly to weekly pay

CN_080291

Hi All.

New to all of this. I have been offered a new job which annually is more than what I am on now. The only thing that is slightly off putting for me is that its going to change from monthly pay to weekly pay. I have used the Gov website to work out my net pay weekly on the new salary but when I'am calculating that into seeing if I would be better off monthly. It actually works out that i would be taking home slightly less. For example - After tax, national ins & pension I've worked it out to be roughly £507 a week. which when multiplied by a 4 week month it only works out as £2,028. I understand that some months have 5 weeks, 2026 has 4 months that have 5 weeks so obviously if working out monthly it would be more. My current position I take home monthly on £2,150 after tax, national ins & pension. But my yearly salary is less than the new job that has been offered.

Does anyone have any tips or information on if my workings out are wrong. If its actually beneficial to be going from monthly pay to weekly.

Its causing me nothing but stress at the moment. I would like to go for this new position but I just have a gut feeling that it would be the wrong decision if financially i am left with less each month and especially when I have direct debits on certain dates that could potentially not be paid in time due to the new weekly pay day.

🤯

la531983

Multiply it by 52 and then divide into 12....

lincroft1710

It is your annual income that is relevant as Income tax for 2026/27 is based on your earnings from April 6 2026 to April 5 2027. Calculate this by multiplying your new weekly gross by 52 and add a day's wage, as a year has 52 weeks and one day (2 in a leap year). Obviously if you start the new job after April 6, you will have to adjust the figures by multiplying number of weeks worked rather than 52.

Exodi

CN_080291

Does anyone have any tips or information on if my workings out are wrong. If its actually beneficial to be going from monthly pay to weekly.

I think it is incorrect to calculate each period individually, else you'll arrive at illogical conclusions that it's better to work at X in February and Y in March.

Take an average, that is 52/12 = 4.33 recurring (MSE won't let me do a vinculum).

So if you take home £507 a week, that is £2,197 a month on average.

Comparing that to your current pay of £2,150 represents a ~2.2% pay increase.

Given that the difference is so small, it's certainly worth looking into the specifics of the pension/bonus/holiday/etc. If your current employer makes a higher pension contribution for example, you could actually be worse off overall.

CN_080291

especially when I have direct debits on certain dates that could potentially not be paid in time due to the new weekly pay day.

This is a different issue, but is very much in keeping with this forums purpose.

You should try to find a way to build a buffer, even if you don't decide to change to weekly pay. It is very risky to be in a position that a single missed paycheck will cause you to default on all of your commitments.

Marcon

For example - After tax, national ins & pension I've worked it out to be roughly £507 a week. which when multiplied by a 4 week month it only works out as £2,028. I understand that some months have 5 weeks, 2026 has 4 months that have 5 weeks so obviously if working out monthly it would be more. My current position I take home monthly on £2,150 after tax, national ins & pension. But my yearly salary is less than the new job that has been offered.

The only month with 4 weeks is February (in a non-leap year); no months have 5 weeks (if they did, they'd need to have 35 days).

As pointed out above, you need to compare the annual salary from your old job with the annual salary for the new job - and take into account the value of any perks, not just pensions.

I just have a gut feeling that it would be the wrong decision if financially i am left with less each month and especially when I have direct debits on certain dates that could potentially not be paid in time due to the new weekly pay day.

If payments are made weekly in arrears, then by the time the DD comes around you'll have enough to pay it.

Grey_Critic

You are making things complicated - compare the Gross annual pay for both jobs. One should be greater than the other. Deductions for tax and NI are deductions

p00hsticks

If you prefer to handle your finances monthly, then set up a new bank account for your weekly salary to be paid into and then simply set up a standing order to transfer a sum across to your current account at the end of each month….

kaMelo

Its causing me nothing but stress at the moment. I would like to go for this new position but I just have a gut feeling that it would be the wrong decision if financially i am left with less each month and especially when I have direct debits on certain dates that could potentially not be paid in time due to the new weekly pay day.

It would only be an issue if you're seriously bad at budgeting. You know the direct debits are coming so budget for them, don't go blowing all your wages every week and then worry that the last week of the month's wages are not going to be enough to cover your direct debits.

There is a bright side too, unlike salaried workers who often work one or two days a year for free, being paid weekly you will get paid for every day you work.

MyRealNameToo

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6665432/going-from-monthly-to-weekly-pay

There are 52 weeks in the year and 12 months so on average each month has 4.33 weeks. If the annualised pay is more then the monthly pay on average is more too. Thats basic logic.

What you will find however is that its a bit of feast and famine, my agency do weekly calcs with monthly payments so I get paid on a 4-4-5 pattern, so two months in a row I get paid for 4 weeks and the 3rd month I get paid 5 weeks and so 2 months are a bit less than I used to get and then one month is a lot more.

It will wash its face in the end but it's a touch annoying at the time. Yours will be slightly different however given you will actually be paid every week but you can effectively do the same, open a new/use a spare account to take the weekly monies coming in and once a month transfer it to your normal account.

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81975251#Comment_81975251

It makes budgeting more complex, in my opinion, if the monies are coming in weekly to the same account that monies are going out of monthly, you can't simply do the I need to leave X% each week because of the different number of weeks in the month.

Its not difficult to simply though by using separate accounts, move the amount needed for DDs etc into one account at the known monthly amount and move the float into savings or pocket money type account. Hopefully your budgets are such that in all months you can do both and just in some months it will be more monies going into savings/pocket account but if not you can at the same time move the extra needed from the previous 5 week months.

kaMelo

It makes budgeting more complex, in my opinion, if the monies are coming in weekly to the same account that monies are going out of monthly, you can't simply do the I need to leave X% each week because of the different number of weeks in the month.

The best advice given to me when I was a teenager was to simply not live payday to payday. Get ahead of the game by paying this months bills with last months pay. Once you have built up that buffer it doesn't matter how many weeks money you get paid this month as they're for paying bills next month.

molerat

The only real downside to weekly pay is the dreaded Week 53 which comes round every 5 or 6 years where you end up getting a P800 from HMRC for the underpaid tax - you have used up all your allowance in the first 52 weeks of the year so owe the tax on that 1/52 of the allowance you have been given extra. There was a big fuss in the papers a few years back when, IIRC, Asda staff and their union were making a fuss over this tax bill and blaming everyone when it was simply their lack of understanding of the system.