A P60 is the end-of-year certificate your employer gives you for each job you were still in on 5 April. It shows your total pay, income tax and National Insurance for that tax year, and it has to reach you by 31 May. It is the document that proves what you were paid and what was deducted, which is why refund claims, mortgage applications and tax queries all ask for it.
What a P60 shows
A P60 covers one employment across a whole tax year, from 6 April to 5 April. It gives your total pay for the year, the income tax deducted from it, the National Insurance contributions you made and the category letter they were charged under, and your final tax code.
If you changed jobs during the year and handed over a P45, the figures from the earlier job are included in the totals, so one P60 can describe the whole year. Where they are shown separately, the certificate says which part came from previous employment.
It can be paper or electronic. An electronic P60 is as valid as a printed one, and employers are free to issue either.
Who gets one, and when
You get a P60 for each job you were still employed in on 5 April. If you left a job during the year, that employer gives you a P45 instead and no P60, because the P45 has already closed your record with them.
The deadline is 31 May following the end of the tax year. That gap exists because the employer has to finish its year-end reporting to HMRC first.
More than one job at 5 April means more than one P60, and the totals on them are not added together by anyone automatically. If you want to know what the year cost you overall, adding them up is your job.
What to check on it
Start with the tax code. It is the instruction everything else followed, so a wrong code makes the tax figure wrong even when the arithmetic is right.
Then compare the totals with the last payslip of the tax year. The year-to-date columns on that payslip and the totals on the P60 should be the same numbers, because they are the same record at the same moment.
Then test the figures against a full year. On £35,000 with code 1257L, a whole tax year produces £4,486.00 of income tax, £1,793.88 of National Insurance and £28,720.12 of take-home pay. A P60 that is far from that, for a year with no unusual months, is worth understanding before the next year builds on it.
Finally, check the National Insurance. Unlike income tax, it is settled period by period and never reconciled at the year end, so nothing will correct it later if it was charged under the wrong category letter.
Why it is the document to keep
A P60 is the evidence behind a claim for overpaid tax, and refund claims can reach back over earlier tax years, so a certificate you no longer have is a claim that is harder to make.
It is asked for as proof of income by lenders and letting agents, and by HMRC when a year's figures are queried.
It is also the record that supports your National Insurance position for that year, which is what builds entitlement to the State Pension and to contribution-based benefits.
If the figures look wrong
Go back to your employer first. A P60 is produced from the payroll record, so an error on the certificate is almost always an error in that record, and it is the employer who can correct it and tell HMRC.
If the pay and deductions are right but the tax looks too high, the cause is more likely to be the tax code than the payroll. A code operated on a week 1 or month 1 basis all year, or a code built on an out-of-date estimate, produces exactly that pattern.
Where the year has closed and too much tax was paid, HMRC reconciles the year against what every employer reported and writes to you with a calculation. The P60 is what you check that letter against.
What if I have lost it?
Unlike a P45, a P60 can be replaced. Ask your employer for a duplicate; they are allowed to issue one, and it is usually marked as a duplicate.
If the employer no longer exists, HMRC holds what was reported for you and your personal tax account shows the pay and tax figures for earlier years, which is enough for most purposes even though it is not the certificate itself.
Why my P60 does not match my salary
Several things make the total pay on a P60 differ from your contractual salary, and none of them is an error. A pay rise part-way through the year, unpaid leave, overtime, a bonus, or statutory maternity or sick pay all change the total.
A pension contribution changes it too, and which way depends on the method. Under salary sacrifice the pay itself is lower. Under a net pay arrangement the taxable figure is lower than the gross. Under relief at source neither changes.
Company benefits are not usually in the pay figure at all. They are taxed through your code or reported separately, which is why someone with a company car can have a P60 that looks unremarkable and a tax figure that does not.
Do I need it for a tax return?
If you complete a Self Assessment return, the employment pages ask for the pay and tax figures your P60 certifies, so it is the document to have beside you. Your Personal Allowance for the year, £12,570 for 2026/27, is applied in the return rather than shown on the certificate.
Keeping it also settles arguments. A return filed from a payslip you half remember is the kind of thing that produces a correction letter a year later.