Pay & Payslips
What a salary actually costs an employer
Understanding the total employment cost explains a great deal about how offers are constructed.
Tobias Lindholm
Contributing writer, Payday Stories
Tobias writes about payslips, deductions and the gap between an offer and a bank balance.
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14 articles
Pay & Payslips
Why a bonus looks brutally taxed in the month it lands
The deduction on a one-off payment usually looks far worse than the rate you actually end up paying.
Pay & Payslips
Why a pay rise moves your take-home by less than you expected
The increment meets deductions at their highest rate, and for some households it also triggers withdrawals elsewhere.
Pay & Payslips
What each deduction line on a payslip actually funds
Some deductions buy you something, some are legal obligations, and some are repayments you agreed to.
Pay & Payslips
Backdated pay rises and the strange month that follows
Arrears arrive as a lump, and a lump behaves differently from the same money spread evenly.
Pay & Payslips
Payroll cut-off dates and why changes never land when you expect
The pay run is prepared well before payday, and anything arriving late waits a full cycle.
Rights at Work
What a payslip has to show you, and why it matters
Most countries require an itemised statement of pay, and the required items are the ones errors hide behind.
Rights at Work
Worker, employee or self-employed: the label that decides your pay rights
Employment status determines which protections apply, and it is decided by the reality of the arrangement rather than the paperwork.
Rights at Work
How redundancy and notice payments are actually calculated
The arithmetic usually rests on service, age in some systems, and a definition of weekly pay that may be capped.
Pay & Payslips
Expenses paid through payroll, and why they are not pay
Reimbursement returns money you already spent. When it is treated as earnings instead, you pay tax for the privilege of funding…
Pay & Payslips
When payroll overpays you and asks for it back
The money arrived, it looked like yours, and it was spent. Recovery is usually lawful, but the amount and the method are both…
Pay & Payslips
Voluntary deductions: the lines you agreed to and forgot
Between the tax lines and the net figure sit deductions you consented to, sometimes years ago. Several of them are no longer doing…
Rights at Work
When your employer changes hands, what happens to your pay
A sale, merger or outsourcing changes who pays you. In many systems it is not supposed to change what you are paid, though practice…
Rights at Work
Agency work, and who is actually responsible for your pay
Three parties, two contracts and one worker. When pay goes wrong, the first question is which organisation is supposed to have paid…