What payrises should you budget for?

[AmberPanda]

Trying to work out if we can afford private for our kids secondary. Looking at fees now and estimating what they will be when they start and the years after that. What should I put as the average yearly increase?
obviously have already accounted for VAT!

My rule of thumb was to allow for inflation plus ~5% - school fee price rises are always slightly ahead of CPI/RPI, because so much of the costs are salaries. And the costs of heating.

Not sure what this government might do with NI in the medium term, but when New Labour hiked it in the early 00s, there was a much larger than usual increase in school fees to cover the new level of employers contributions. Changes to the teachers pension scheme can also increase employment costs, for those schools that want to remain within it - there were changes not so long ago, and it's anyone's guess how long before that comes round again.