Income Tax (Earnings and Pensions) Act 2003

Redundancy payments

309 Limited exemptions for statutory redundancy payments

(1) No liability to income tax in respect of earnings arises by virtue of a redundancy payment or an approved contractual payment, except where subsection (2) applies.

(2) Where an approved contractual payment exceeds the amount which would have been due if a redundancy payment had been payable, the excess is liable to income tax.

(3) No liability to income tax in respect of employment income other than earnings arises by virtue of a redundancy payment or an approved contractual payment, except where it does so by virtue of Chapter 3 of Part 6 (payments and benefits on termination of employment etc.).

(4) For the purposes of this section—

(a) a statutory payment in respect of a redundancy payment is to be treated as paid on account of the redundancy payment, and

(b) a statutory payment in respect of an approved contractual payment is to be treated as paid on account of the approved contractual payment.

(5) In this section—

• “approved contractual payment” means a payment to a person on the termination of the person’s employment under an agreement in respect of which an order is in force under section 157 of ERA 1996 or Article 192 of ER(NI)O 1996,

• “redundancy payment” means a redundancy payment under Part 11 of ERA 1996 or Part 12 of ER(NI)O 1996, and

• “statutory payment” means a payment under section 167(1) of ERA 1996 or Article 202(1) of ER(NI)O 1996.

(6) In subsection (5) “employment”, in relation to a person, has the meaning given in section 230(5) of ERA 1996 or Article 3(5) of ER(NI)O 1996.