GOV.UK
1. Overview
Your employer or pension provider uses your tax code to work out how much tax to take from your pay or pension.
HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) works out your tax code and sends it to your employer or pension provider.
Usually a tax code is 3 numbers and a letter.
Most people born after 5 April 1948 with 1 job have 1000L as their tax code for the 2014 to 2015 tax year.
If you’ve only got 1 employer or pension, you’ll have 1 tax code.
But if you get income from more than 1 employer or pension provider, each will usually use a different tax code. This is because HMRC will adjust your tax codes so you:
- get your tax-free Personal Allowance
- pay the right amount of tax for all of your income, spread over a year
Your tax code doesn’t tell employers or pension providers how much you earn - it only tells them how much tax they need to take from payments they make to you.
Where to find your tax code
You can get your tax code from:
- payslips from your employer or pension provider
- P45 from an employer if you leave a job
- P60 from your employer at the end of each tax year
- a PAYE Coding Notice - you may get one by post or you can check using HMRC’s Self Assessment online service if you’re registered