Must you pay your 2015/16 personal allowance of £10,600 monthly?

[ujjain]

Must you pay your personal allowance of £10,600 monthly or can you pay yourself the entire amount at the start of the 2015/16 tax year?

[AJ1982]

I think the advice is, well from my Accountant, was to pay at end of year rather than start.

[Jessica@WhiteFieldTax]

You could pay it at the outset, but assuming you are paying as salary you would need to set an annual earnings period and process as month 12 to avoid some strange Tax and NI figures.

Paying it monthly, if salary, is more normal, but there is no absolute requirement.

[Ticktock]

This reminds me. My salary gets paid at the end of this month - 1 annual payment. I'd forgotten all about it, so it's a nice bonus for me to splurge.

[northernladuk]

Must you pay your personal allowance of £10,600 monthly or can you pay yourself the entire amount at the start of the 2015/16 tax year?

Loads of threads on exactly this topic... Fill your boots here...

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=pa...ntractoruk.com

[ujjain]

Thanks northernaluk, I guess I should have googled "salary in advance". The content of the next topics both give some good answers and it's not really worth it deviating from the norm of paying yourself the salary monthly unless you really need the money and paying yourself dividends generally is the better option, as paying your yearly salary ahead does come with some implications.

http://forums.contractoruk.com/accou...y-advance.html
http://forums.contractoruk.com/accou...advance-2.html

[Contreras]

Thanks northernaluk, I guess I should have googled "salary in advance". The content of the next topics both give some good answers and it's not really worth it deviating from the norm of paying yourself the salary monthly unless you really need the money and paying yourself dividends generally is the better option, as paying your yearly salary ahead does come with some implications.

http://forums.contractoruk.com/accou...y-advance.html
http://forums.contractoruk.com/accou...advance-2.html

Bear in mind that the advice in those threads is now ~3 years old.

Yes, salary can be run as monthly, quarterly, or annually. HMRC must be informed as it affects when they expect RTI (and when you will be fined for missing these).

If paying as an annual lump sum then postponing until late in the year keeps your options open with regard to tax planning, should you switch to perm for example. The main reason for doing it annually however is to cut down on payroll admin. Nothing to stop you paying dividends at other points in the year as and when profits allow.

It seems to me that advance salary being deemed a loan is a moot point now that we have RTI - in my (unqualified) opinion.

[northernladuk]

True. I thought we had covered this at least twice recently though.