Common Tax Rates & Bands 2020 and 2021

Nearly all income is liable to tax. Tax on income that you earn from employment is deducted from your wages by your employer on behalf of Revenue. This is known as Pay As You Earn (PAYE). The amount of tax that you have to pay depends on the amount of the income that you earn and on your personal circumstances. There are a range of income tax reliefs that are available that can reduce the amount of tax you have to pay.

Click to download our guide to common tax rates and bands for the years 2020 and 2021.

What is a tax rate band?

A tax rate band is the amount of income which will be taxed at a particular percentage (tax rate). The current tax rates are 20% and 40%. A portion of your income will be taxed at 20% and the remainder will be taxed at 40%.

Standard Rate of Tax

Your income up to a certain limit is taxed at the ‘standard rate’ of Income Tax, which is currently 20%. This is known as the standard rate band.

Higher Rate of Tax

Any income above your standard rate band is taxed at the higher rate of Income Tax, which is currently 40%.

What is your rate band?

The amount of your tax rate band is dependent on your personal circumstances. For example, whether you are:

• single
• married or in a civil partnership
• a widowed person or surviving civil partner.

You can find a list of the tax rate bands, for this year and the previous four years, in the Tax rates, bands and reliefs chart.

How rate bands work?

If you are an employee, then your tax rate band will be shown on your Tax Credit Certificate. Your employer will use this to calculate the amount of tax to deduct from your weekly or monthly pay.

Under the Pay As You Earn (PAYE) system, tax rate bands are spread evenly throughout the year. If you are working for the full year, depending on how often you get paid your tax rate bands will be divided as follows:

• 52 equal weekly amounts
• 12 equal monthly amounts.

If you have a second or multiple jobs, you can divide your rate band between them.

Unused rate bands

You cannot get a refund of any unused tax rate bands and you cannot carry them over into another tax year. 

If you have any further queries or need assistance with any of the above please contact Gallagher Keane Chartered Accountants.

Contact Information

Email: [email protected]

Call: +353 1 9695100

For further information visit Revenue.ie