Key tax rates, limits and allowances: Your at-a-glance guide

Tax rates, allowances and bands often change when one tax year finishes and a new one begins.

Knowing what they are can help you work out how much tax you’ll pay each year and ensure that you make the most of all exemptions and reliefs available to you.

Rates and allowances for the current tax year, which runs from 6 April 2020 to 5 April 2021, and for reference the 2019-20 tax year too, are shown here.

Remember, tax rules can change in future and their effects on you will depend on your individual circumstances.

Personal Allowances

The tax-free Personal Allowance is the amount of income you can earn before you have to start paying tax. All individuals are now entitled to the same personal allowance, regardless of their age.

The personal allowance is reduced by £1 for every £2 of an individual's adjusted net income above £100,000 potentially removing the allowance in full.

The allowances shown below are available to certain individuals in addition to the personal allowance above.

A spouse or civil partner who isn’t liable to income tax above the basic rate may transfer £1,250 in the 2020-21 tax year of their unused personal allowance to their spouse or civil partner, as long as the recipient isn’t liable to income tax above the basic rate.

Married couple’s allowance where one spouse or civil partner was born before 6 April 1935:

This allowance is subject to a £30,200 income limit in the 2020-21 tax year (£29,600 in 2019-20). The individual’s married couple’s allowance is reduced by £1 for every £2 above this limit. Tax relief for married couple’s allowance is given at a rate of 10%.

Personal Savings Allowance

The Personal Savings Allowance (PSA) was introduced on 6 April 2016 which according to government statistics means around 95% of savers no longer pay any tax on the interest they earn on their savings.

Basic rate taxpayers will not have to pay tax on the first £1,000 of their savings income.

Higher rate taxpayers will not have to pay tax on the first £500 of their savings income.

There is no personal savings allowance for additional rate taxpayers.

These allowances remain unchanged for the 2020-21 tax year.

Scottish rates and bands for 2020-21

Savings income and dividend tax rates

All taxpayers have an annual tax-free dividend allowance of £2,000, so only dividend income above this allowance is taxed.

The dividend allowance is in addition to your personal allowance. In 2020-21 the personal allowance is £12,500. This means that if you receive £14,000 in dividend income next tax year, the first £12,500 could be covered by the personal allowance and the remaining £1,500 by the dividend allowance, so no tax would be payable (assuming you receive no other income).

Tax-free savings account allowances

You can use your full £20,000 allowance in an investment ISA, or split however you want across a cash ISA, investment ISA, lifetime ISA (max £4,000), and an innovative finance ISA.

Find out more about our Investment ISA

Pensions

The annual allowance restricts the amount of pension contributions you can make each year while still receiving tax relief. Provided you meet certain conditions, you can carry forward any unused allowance from the previous three tax years, as long as it doesn’t exceed your earnings in the current tax year.

Exceptions:

1. If your adjusted earnings are greater than £240,000, you lose £1 of tax relief for every £2 you earn over £240,000, up to a maximum reduction of £36,000. This means if you earn £312,000 or more, your annual allowance will drop to £4,000. Adjusted income includes both personal and employer pension contributions. This tapered reduction doesn’t apply to anyone with ‘threshold income’ of no more than £200,000. Threshold income excludes pension contributions. Your annual allowance will therefore only be reduced if both your ‘threshold income’ is above £200,000 and your ‘adjusted income’ is over £240,000.
   
   So, for example, if you earn more than £200,000 and you contribute the full allowance of £40,000, you might be affected, as your adjusted income will be over £240,000, and your threshold income is over £200,000.


2. From the point that you draw pension benefits that are eligible to be taxed, you lose your annual allowance and it’s replaced by the Money Purchase Annual Allowance (MPAA) of £4,000. You’re also no longer able to carry forward any unused annual allowance from previous tax years.

The lifetime allowance relates to the maximum amount of pension savings you can build up over your lifetime without incurring a supplemental tax. The lifetime allowance is measured on each occasion that you start drawing benefits from any of your pensions. If the total value of all your pension savings exceeds this allowance, then additional tax applies. 

National Insurance Contributions – lower earnings limit (below which they aren't paid)

The self-employed are required to start paying NICs once annual profits reach £6,475 (£6,365 in 2019-20).

Inheritance tax

Inheritance tax is payable at a rate of 40% above these thresholds. In the 2020-21 tax year, everyone is entitled to an additional £175,000 tax-free allowance which can be used against the value of their home. This allowance may only be used when you leave your home to your children or grandchildren. This allowance will be reduced for estates with a net value exceeding £2m, by £1 for every £2 that the estate exceeds this amount.

Capital gains tax allowance

If you invest outside an ISA, any profits made above the annual CGT allowance are subject to tax at 10% or 20% depending on your tax band. Since April 2016, there is an additional 8% surcharge to be paid on residential property and carried interest (the share of profits or gains that is paid to asset managers).

CGT on residential property generally does not apply to your main home, only to additional properties (such as a flat you let out).