Proving net salary to Government Childcare 15 free hours

[Della999]

Has anyone earned a gross salary of slightly over £100K but their net being less than £100K and showed this successfully to the childcare government agency to obtain the 15 or 30 free hours, + 20% childcare allowance?

My husband is due to increase his salary by a few hundred pounds, and this will tip him over the edge of the £100K threshold. He doesn't contribute to a private pension, but if he does this can be deducted from the gross salary, and this seems to be acceptable to the government. But I wondered how I will prove this every three months, other than printing out statements from our accounts and the pension to prove contributions?

Any experience gratefully received.

No - you don't falsify your income to HMRC.

Put the extra in a pension as you suggest. Every 3 months you do a declaration re. your earnings, but you don't need to provide proof .

If he doesn't have a private pension, the workplace one is just as legitimate a place to put the gross earnings over £100k.

Thank you for your reply. I’m not trying to falsify any income, all I was asking was how to prove that the net income is below the £100K threshold. We have an accountant, and he has advised this is the correct and legal strategy, but was wondering about the practicalities for re-accrediting every 3 mths.

You don't have to prove it, you just have to declare the income isn't over £100k by ticking a box. I presume they do spot check people in which case a pay slip or statement of contributions would do it.

But wouldn't you just do it the same way you currently do - just tick the box to confirm. You don't need any proof at the moment to show his net pay is under £100k.

As above you don't have to prove it. I would say at least once a year instead of the reconfirmation going through automatically, we get a message saying I need to call them with further details, but its a pointless exercise really, because all they do is basically ask me are you sure he will earn under 100k, I say yes (because like you we dump money into a pension to ensure this is the case) & they approve it!

Thank you so much for the real world experience. This is what I was after. Somehow I had visions of alarms going off in a government office when I re-confirmed every three months and needing to contact them and get really involved. I now have peace of mind. Thank you ☺️