Salary Payments
The Univeristy payroll function is operated centrally, not by the Faculty, and we do not have access at Faculty level to copies of payslips, personal tax codes or employee deductions for tax etc. However payroll queries may be sent to payroll@law.ox.ac.uk or contact Emma Gascoigne, Faculty Personnel Officer.
University employees can access payslips, P60s and other information about their employment online via the HR Self-Service employee dashboard. Visit the Staff Gateway page for more information and to log-in using your SSO. You can also contact the central university payroll team. If your bank or address details change please log on to the HR Self-Service to enter the up to date information.
Your salary will be paid into your nominated bank account on the last but one working day of each month. See the University website for the current year's pay dates.
Income Tax and Joint Appointments
Associate Professors - Tutorial Fellowships (AP-TFC and AP-TFU) posts are ‘joint appointments’. Postholders are employed by both the University and their colleges and receive a salary from each. However, the PAYE tax system only allows individuals to have one main employment, to which their personal tax allowances are applied; income from second and subsequent employments can only be taxed at either the basic rate of 20% or the higher rate of 40%.
Tax codes are issued to employers by Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (HMRC). HMRC have the facility to aggregate income from multiple employments using an individual’s tax code, to check that the correct amount of tax has been paid, and to amend tax codes where required. There are three different scenarios that might apply to the holders of Oxford joint appointments :
1. The combined income is below the higher rate threshold.
The postholder’s tax allowances will be applied to their ‘main’ job using a tax code in the format 1257L. The standard code for the 2021/22 tax year is 1257L representing the standard personal, tax free allwoance of £12,570 and the second job will be taxed at the basic rate (using tax code BR).
2. Income from the main job alone is above the higher rate threshold.
The postholder’s tax allowances will be applied to their ‘main’ job as above and the second job will be taxed at the higher rate (using tax code DO).
3. The combined income is above the higher rate threshold, but income from the main job alone is below the higher rate threshold.
In this situation, taxing the income from the second job at the higher rate would result in an individual paying too much tax, as their main job does not use up all of their basic rate allowance. Instead, the second job will continue to be taxed at the basic rate and HMRC will issue a special tax code (in the format K123) which adds untaxed income from other sources to the income from the employment so that the tax due can be collected through PAYE.
These ‘K codes’ are issued in response to HMRC’s examination of employers’ end of year returns and are therefore based on historical salary information. Salary increases during a tax year will result in underpayment of tax at the end of it. HMRC will collect underpayments of up to £2,000 through the following year’s tax code, but larger amounts will be requested directly.
In order to avoid being faced with an unexpected tax bill, the holders of joint appointments are advised to check their salary details and the tax codes that have been issued to them and to contact HMRC if they are concerned about being undertaxed through the PAYE system. That way a revised code can be issued and the correct tax collected during the tax year.
For the 2021/22 tax year, higher rate tax of 40% will start to apply once total taxable income exceeds £50,270. if you fall into this bracket you may wish to check that they are being taxed correctly. The tax codes which are being used by each of your employers will be shown on your payslips.
If you think that the tax code being used for you by the University is wrong, you should contact the University’s tax office:
Inland Revenue South Wales Area
Ty Glas
Llanishen
Cardiff CF14 5YF
Tel. 0845 300 3948
The University’s PAYE reference is 075/Z1035.
Your college will have a different PAYE reference and may be the responsibility of a different tax office; your college accountant should be able to give you those details.
All of these scenarios assume that the joint appointment is the academic’s only source of income; if there are other sources of income, such as self-employment, the situation may be different.