DevOps contractor on £90,000

Personal Ltd Co. Outside IR35. Age 34. Pension preference: modest.

Every figure on this page is computed at build time by the same engines that power the live salary–dividend split, take-home and SIPP optimiser calculators. Inputs come from a single CSV row; outputs come from the engines. No static lookup tables, no hand-coded numbers.

Net cash

£49,013

Pension

£26,000

Effective rate

16.7%

Marginal rate

33.8%

The decision tree for a devops contractor at this income level

A devops contractor thinking through "how should I structure this income for tax efficiency" hits the same five branches every time. Walk the tree for this exact scenario (gross £90,000 for 2026/27):

Is the engagement inside or outside IR35? Inside (umbrella) means no dividend extraction, no employer pension dodge, full PAYE deduction. Outside (Ltd Co) means access to the optimiser. This row models the outside-IR35 Ltd Co route.
Are you using the £12,570 Personal Allowance? Yes — fully. No other personal income is in play, so all £12,570 of PA is available to absorb the cheapest slice of structure-specific income.
Are you above the £100,000 PA taper? No — gross sits comfortably below the £100,000 trigger.
How heavily are you using the pension wrapper? Moderately — the search treats £1 of pension as worth £0.50 of cash today, producing a balanced cash / pension split. The pension contribution chosen by the engine for this row: £26,000.
What is the resulting net cash? £49,013. Net wealth including pension: £75,013.

For the second-order question — what would happen at a different profit level, a different age, or a different pension preference — the same engine drives the salary-dividend split calculator, the take-home (inside vs outside IR35) calculator, and the SIPP optimiser. Each one accepts the inputs of this row as a starting point.

The numbers, line by line

Optimum salary	£12,570
Optimum dividend	£40,716
Optimum pension	£26,000
Net cash (optimum)	£49,013
Net wealth (cash + pension)	£75,013
Rule-of-thumb net cash	£61,674
Rule-of-thumb net wealth	£61,674
Saving vs rule of thumb	£340
Effective rate on profit	16.7%
Marginal rate (next £1 dividend)	33.8%

Why this scenario is different

Compared to the closest peer profile — Software contractor at £90,000 — this scenario sits £0 higher on gross income. That moves net cash by +£0, the pension contribution by +£0, and the effective rate by +0%. The effective rate moves only modestly — both scenarios sit inside the same binding tax band. The optimiser shifts £0 of the extraction out of the dividend slice, and £0 out of pension contributions.

Questions this scenario raises

Where does the BracketMath engine source its rates?

Income tax / NI / CT / dividend rates come from HMRC's published 2026/27 rate tables (gov.uk/government/publications/rates-and-allowances-income-tax). Pension rules come from FA 2004 and the FCA's consumer guidance. Historical investment returns used in the Monte Carlo engine come from a 125-year UK gilt + UK equity series stored in src/data/historical-returns.json. Every constant carries a source URL in the source code.

Why does the page link to specific other professions?

The five linked pages at the bottom are computed by a similarity metric over (profession, income, structure, age band) — the closest five neighbours in that space, not the same five pages every row links to. The aim is a genuine cross-link graph rather than a star pattern that search engines correctly read as a pSEO signal.

Should I take dividends now or wait until next tax year?

Tax-year-end timing matters: a dividend declared in March 2027 is taxed at 2026/27 rates; one declared in April 2027 falls into 2027/28 (potentially still in the same calendar year). If your 2026/27 personal income is bunched in basic-rate territory and 2027/28 will be in higher-rate, accelerate. If the reverse, defer. The mathematical structure is "level the tax-band utilisation across years if income is volatile."

Are dividend tax rates rising in 2026/27?

No — the 8.75% / 33.75% / 39.35% rates were set in 2022 and have been held flat through 2026/27. The Dividend Allowance has been reduced from £2,000 (2022/23) to £500 (2024/25 onwards) which has the same effect as a ~£175 tax rise at any rate band. This figure is built into every dividend-related calculation on the site.

How does the Pension Annual Allowance taper work?

Above £260,000 of adjusted income, the £60,000 Annual Allowance reduces by £1 for every £2 over the threshold, down to a £10,000 floor at £360,000 of adjusted income. The taper bites later than the £100k Personal Allowance taper but is similarly punitive on pension contributions specifically.

Methodology

Income tax, National Insurance and Corporation Tax bands taken from HMRC's 2026/27 rates and allowances tables (gov.uk/.../income-tax; corporation-tax). Pension Annual Allowance and taper rules from Finance Act 2004 / 2023. Trading allowance per ITTOIA 2005 s.783A. Voluntary Class 2 figure (£179.40/yr = £3.45/wk × 52) from HMRC voluntary NI guidance.

Style: 2026/27 tax year throughout; figures rounded to whole pounds in the user-facing prose; effective rates computed as (deductions / gross). The voice is methodological — no first person, no claimed credentials, no marketing fluff.

This page is not personalised advice; for advice regulated by the FCA, consult an adviser registered with the Financial Conduct Authority. See the full disclaimer.