Question on pension contribution

[Humber12]

rfd, based on your example the amount you can claim would be 1000, as this is what your employer pays you.

I too contribute towards a pension and have always included the basic pay when calculating previous earnings. I have done this twice based on my understanding of the Tier 1 Guidance & never had an issue with the UKBA. I.e. I was always awarded the points I claimed. I always highlight the basic pay amount on my payslips and include a cover letter for clarity with my applications.

The fact that you contribute towards a pension is irrelevant & has no effect here.

The UKBA reference I used is under point 92.

"We will assess an applicant’s earnings. If an applicant is in salaried employment, (including a Director of a company for example) we will assess the applicant’s gross salary before tax."
http://www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/sitec ... idance.pdf

This is very helpful posting...
Could you however tell me how you have proved the before tax pension to home office. Obviously it will not show in salary slip as in mine.......

I'm not entirely sure I understand your question here. Though from your comment I suspect your payslip breakdown may be different to mine. In my case my payslips have always contained the following breakdown along with other information (I.e. other taxable benefits, tax paid, NI contributions etc...):

1) Total monthly pay I receive from my employer before tax (generally referred to by many as Gross Pay)
2) Total monthly Employee Pension Contribution
3) Total monthly pay that is subject to tax.
4) Total monthly net pay

What is relevant when claiming points for previous earnings is the amount under point 1) above. What I have always done when applying is highlight amount 1) in all my payslips and use that total to claim points for my previous earnings. I additionally highlight 4) in my payslip & bank statement to make it easy for the case worker to verify my claimed previous earnings in the two sources of evidence (I.e. in my case payslip & bank statement) & include a cover letter explaining what I have done.

Note that my understanding of the Tier 1 guidance is that they tell you that they will assess the applicant’s gross salary before tax to avoid confusion. I.e. otherwise an applicant may think they can only claim points for their net pay. I see many applicants over-complicate this simple calculation, but it may be that you need additional documentation to support your application if your payslip does not contain the breakdown I have mentioned. Note that there is no requirement to provide evidence for the pension contributions you make as it is not relevant here.

Thanks! you are correct, my payslips does not show my pension contributions. So I cannot provide payslips and bank statements as pension deduction evidence. The payslips just show annual gross salary after deduction of pension. I realized this at later stage so I decided to opt out of pension deduction this year but still have to include 7 months from company's last financial year (Dec11 to June 12) where pension was deducted.

My understanding to prove this as my earning is by providing one evidence from HR and one evidence form the company which hold our pension contributions. Will this be enough what you guys think?

Just as last note this is only a backup plan. if my company hits the sale target this month then I will be over my required limit and will not be including the complicated pension contributions evidence.

[cs95tdg]

rfd, based on your example the amount you can claim would be 1000, as this is what your employer pays you.

I too contribute towards a pension and have always included the basic pay when calculating previous earnings. I have done this twice based on my understanding of the Tier 1 Guidance & never had an issue with the UKBA. I.e. I was always awarded the points I claimed. I always highlight the basic pay amount on my payslips and include a cover letter for clarity with my applications.

The fact that you contribute towards a pension is irrelevant & has no effect here.

The UKBA reference I used is under point 92.

"We will assess an applicant’s earnings. If an applicant is in salaried employment, (including a Director of a company for example) we will assess the applicant’s gross salary before tax."
http://www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/sitec ... idance.pdf

This is very helpful posting...
Could you however tell me how you have proved the before tax pension to home office. Obviously it will not show in salary slip as in mine.......

I'm not entirely sure I understand your question here. Though from your comment I suspect your payslip breakdown may be different to mine. In my case my payslips have always contained the following breakdown along with other information (I.e. other taxable benefits, tax paid, NI contributions etc...):

1) Total monthly pay I receive from my employer before tax (generally referred to by many as Gross Pay)
2) Total monthly Employee Pension Contribution
3) Total monthly pay that is subject to tax.
4) Total monthly net pay

What is relevant when claiming points for previous earnings is the amount under point 1) above. What I have always done when applying is highlight amount 1) in all my payslips and use that total to claim points for my previous earnings. I additionally highlight 4) in my payslip & bank statement to make it easy for the case worker to verify my claimed previous earnings in the two sources of evidence (I.e. in my case payslip & bank statement) & include a cover letter explaining what I have done.

Note that my understanding of the Tier 1 guidance is that they tell you that they will assess the applicant’s gross salary before tax to avoid confusion. I.e. otherwise an applicant may think they can only claim points for their net pay. I see many applicants over-complicate this simple calculation, but it may be that you need additional documentation to support your application if your payslip does not contain the breakdown I have mentioned. Note that there is no requirement to provide evidence for the pension contributions you make as it is not relevant here.

Thanks! you are correct, my payslips does not show my pension contributions. So I cannot provide payslips and bank statements as pension deduction evidence. The payslips just show annual gross salary after deduction of pension. I realized this at later stage so I decided to opt out of pension deduction this year but still have to include 7 months from company's last financial year (Dec11 to June 12) where pension was deducted.

My understanding to prove this as my earning is by providing one evidence from HR and one evidence form the company which hold our pension contributions. Will this be enough what you guys think?

Just as last note this is only a backup plan. if my company hits the sale target this month then I will be over my required limit and will not be including the complicated pension contributions evidence.

I would suggest that you get a letter from your employer outlining your gross pay (which would be before any deductions, i.e. including pension) & net pay for each of the months you plan to use towards previous earnings. This can be used in place of your payslips along with the associated bank statements. Personally I would keep the number of pieces of evidence to a minimum to make it easy for a case worker to verify and cross check.