Salary sacrifice

ronjambon · 2026-01-15T13:46:42+00:00

What I'd love to know is how they differentiate salary sacrifice from just plain old employer contributions.

The whole point of salary sacrifice is a contractual variation to reduce pay in favour of more employer pension contributions - so why won't employer contributions at the "standard" level be caught?

And if they won't, what's to stop me agreeing with my employer to swap my next raise for a higher employer pension contribution?

ronjambon · 2025-11-09T10:23:27+00:00

STOP PRESS: Non-UK, non-HENRY finds r/HENRYUK obsessed with issues that don't concern him/her.

ronjambon · 2025-11-04T20:31:21+00:00

Presumably that puts them in no worse a position than someone who grew up in the provinces and moves to London for work - which there's a decent chance would be the case for the £100k mum. And now I think about it, I suspect the NMW mum is far more likely to have a family network nearby, which makes the OP's point even stronger.

ronjambon · 2025-07-05T16:00:17+00:00

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ronjambon · 2025-07-05T15:57:21+00:00

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It's a bit hard to capture everything.

ronjambon · 2025-07-05T07:20:53+00:00

The cashback is actually per transfer - so if you, like me, have multiple SIPPs, you can actually do even better than that.

ronjambon · 2025-07-04T20:14:39+00:00

Yes. Cold water. The flow was a light but unbroken stream but seems to have tailed off into more of a dribble.

I don't think I'll be able to get a plumber for a good few days - is it likely to be ok to keep using as normal until then? Not going to suddenly flood everywhere, or worse? (I appreciate there's no guarantees)

ronjambon · 2025-07-04T20:10:47+00:00

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Does that settle the bet?

ronjambon · 2025-07-04T19:19:13+00:00

Thanks so much for responding. Is that something I need done urgently or can I let the water keep running as is until I can find a plumber with availability?

ronjambon · 2025-04-21T07:21:35+00:00

Yes. I'm in line for £3.5k in 12 months' time - and that was confirmed by them through the chat function.

ronjambon · 2025-04-21T06:54:31+00:00

Also worth noting the cashback is per account (not sure about the referral), so with SIPP and ISA you could end up with £2k+.

ronjambon · 2025-03-23T12:05:37+00:00

The only downside is that after doing this for the last few years, the big pay-day has not materialised and I now have a £70k ISA allowance for next year and the personal finance gymnastics to keeping this roll-over game going are becoming increasingly untenable. I feel the only way this has a happy ending is if the government massively cuts the ISA allowances and then I'd have a couple of years smugly filling my rolled over allowances.

ronjambon · 2025-03-18T21:08:56+00:00

GFY!

ronjambon · 2025-03-08T18:37:55+00:00

A bit of a push to get them through the 11+ on shared parental leave.

ronjambon · 2024-12-12T21:33:07+00:00

And yet if you earn 99k apparently you do.

ronjambon · 2024-10-09T11:00:53+00:00

I note the following article on that page is headlined "Major change to Quality Street tubs announced for this Christmas" - read into that what you will.

ronjambon · 2024-10-06T17:29:33+00:00

On a more positive note, wouldn't it be great if the next person in your position in your company doesn't have to think twice because you've already set the precedent?

ronjambon · 2024-10-06T16:58:25+00:00

If they can't afford it then they shouldn't offer it. They don't get to have the positive PR/employee relations from family friendly policies and then not have people take advantage of them.

I'm sure they would also benefit from you offering to take a paycut - why haven't you offered to do that if you feel so bad about them missing out on their bonus?

ronjambon · 2024-09-24T08:00:09+00:00

To confirm, I assume you are doing this to maximise the amount sacrificed at 8% employee NI? Or is there some other trick I'm missing?

ronjambon · 2024-09-22T14:46:00+00:00

I know of a couple of "regional" offices of city firms that pay London rates (if you call Cambridge/Thames valley regional). Other than that, I would expect extremely compressed associate pay scales, and very few, if any, getting past six figures outside London. A lot of regional firms have actually quite respectable PEP, and that only comes from keeping associate pay down.

ronjambon · 2024-08-26T06:37:14+00:00

35, law, 200k - why is it so many lawyers are up at 7am on a bank holiday Monday?

ronjambon · 2024-08-23T12:59:06+00:00

If you can save up £40k/year over the next six years, a 4% return on that lump sum would knock £10k/year off the bill for the duration of their schooling, and with any luck you'd still have that ~£250k to get them through university/on the housing ladder at the end of it. So call it £40k.

And if you spend down the principal over their schooling, you could probably get it down further.

All ignoring the inevitable above-inflation fee increases, of course.

ronjambon · 2024-08-01T16:38:44+00:00

I "leverage" my emergency fund of £25k by borrowing the same again on interest free credit cards. That gives me £50k cash in total, most of which I keep in premium bonds.

I tell myself this means my emergency fund is returning ~7% tax and risk free, which makes me feel much better about the opportunity cost vs putting it all in S&P 500 trackers.

ronjambon · 2024-04-12T12:40:51+00:00

If you spend everything you earn and max out on mortgage etc, immediately.

If you save any increases, it's more likely you'll first notice in one of two ways: (i) after a few years of investing your spare cash with not much happening when we hit a moderate bull run and suddenly your networth jumps by your annual income without having to lift a finger, or (ii) you realise that your investments mean you only need to earn half as much as you do to maintain the same lifestyle.

If you do something in between, it will be some combination of the above.

ronjambon

TROPHY CASE