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Autumn News
Da Vinci Or PAYE?
Some PAYE coding notices might have been devised to conceal the location of the Holy Grail. It's estimated that about half of them are wrong, and HMRC frequently send out revised codings without an obvious reason. The simplest thing to understand is this: if an "L" or "T" code number is low, you will suffer more PAYE than you otherwise would. If the number starts with a K, it's effectively a tax charge, and you will suffer more tax the higher it is. If you fill in a tax return at the end of the year, an unfavourable code will be corrected in the end, but they will have had your money for a year and a half.HMRC often try to collect tax on savings income or rent through the PAYE code. They are entitled to try this on, but you are entitled to refuse. If they put the right numbers on the code it can save you filling in a tax return, but that's fairly unlikely. So you might as well ask for the code only to deal with employment income - pay and benefits - and leave the other income for later. HMRC will correct a code if asked, but it may take some time. If you ask for a change after January they may not issue a revised code before the March payslip is issued, and then it would be too late to affect your PAYE for the year.
If you are not sure what your code should be, or you just want to understand what it means, we can explain it.
