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Schedule E is dead

One of the stranger tax changes of recent times is the abolition of the well-known Schedule E (the technical name for employment income) by the Income Tax (Earnings and Pensions) Act 2003, which came into force on 6 April. Sadly, salary is still taxable, but it is no longer known for tax purposes as 'Schedule E income'. There is no snappy equivalent term in the new Act, so perhaps - following the example of the pop-star Prince - it will have to be called 'the charge formerly known as Schedule E'.

The new law is supposed to simplify the taxation of employment and pensions, but taking all the existing law and putting it somewhere else (in an Act with over 700 sections) starts off by making it harder to find anything! There are some relatively minor changes to the detailed rules, but overall it is business as usual, by another name.