Just as businesses up and down the UK prepare for a 1.25 percentage point increase to National Insurance (NI) rates in April as part of the new Health and Social Care Levy the Chancellor has announced amendments to the NI thresholds to soften the blow for employees, but not employers.
Despite calls to scrap the NI rates increase within his Spring Budget, this is still planned to go ahead from 6 April 2022 and will see both the rate for employees and employers rise by 1.25 percentage points.
To offset the effects of this rise, the Primary Threshold (PT) – the point at which employees start paying National Insurance – will increase by £3,000 from July to bring it in line with the personal tax allowance of £12,570, which is the rate at which workers begin to pay income tax.
The change does not affect the Secondary Threshold, which is the point at which Employers start paying National Insurance Contributions (NIC). This will remain the same.
The Treasury has said that this change will help cut up to £6 billion worth of NICs – cutting the NIC bill for the ‘typical employee’ by around £330 a year.
Although this does represent a saving, in reality, much of this ‘tax cut’ is taken up by the previously announced rise in NI rates, so its impact may not be as great as some workers had hoped.
Nevertheless, employers will need to account for this change within their payroll processes and may need to update the systems they use to account for the change in the threshold.
Do you need assistance calculating the new NIC rates for your employees? Please contact your Seymour Taylor representative today or email enquiries@stca.co.uk or call 01494 552100 to speak to our payroll team.
This blog is for guidance only, professional advice should be obtained before acting on any information contained herein. The information was correct at the time of publishing 5th April 2022.