Every week, we pull together the most relevant stories for your personal finances.
š One income, two tax allowances - the perks single-earner households can often miss
šļø Something a bit different: the 1908 crisis that created the UK State Pension - and what it still means today
š„ Energy bills are rising again from 1 October, even after the government's tax cut - here's what to do about it
š£ļø This week we asked a coach: My partner stays at home to look after our children and isnāt earning at the moment - are we missing out on anything by only having one income going into savings and pensions?
When one partner isn't earning (or earns much less), it's easy for a household's tax planning to default entirely to whoever earns the most - but that can mean missing out on allowances the lower or non-earning partner has just as much right to.
A non-earning spouse can still pay up to Ā£2,880 a year into their own pension and have the government top it up with 20% tax relief to Ā£3,600 total, even with no earnings at all - useful in its own right.
Child benefit is worth Ā£27.05 a week for the eldest child and Ā£17.90 for each additional child, but starts tapering once either partner earns over Ā£60,000 and disappears entirely at Ā£80,000. Free childcare hours (15 a week for all parents) don't require both partners to work, but the additional hours some households rely on do require both partners working, with neither earning over Ā£100,000.
If most of the household income comes from one salary, it's worth deliberately using the lower (or non-earning) partner's tax position rather than letting everything default to whoever earns the most. The pension top-up is genuinely free money - a Ā£2,880 contribution becomes Ā£3,600 with basic-rate tax relief added automatically, even though no tax was paid on the money in the first place. It's also usually more tax-efficient to hold savings and investments outside a pension in the lower earner's name: capital gains tax can fall to 18% rather than 24%, and dividend tax to 10.75% rather than 39.35%, purely because of which income tax band applies to that person's other income.
It's also worth double-checking who's registered to claim child benefit if either of you is close to the Ā£60,000-Ā£80,000 taper zone, and that ISA allowances aren't going to waste - each partner has their own Ā£20,000 annual ISA allowance regardless of who's earning, so a working partner can gift money into a non-working partner's ISA, using up both allowances (Ā£40,000 between two people) rather than leaving one sitting unused.
Worth knowing:
None of this requires anything complicated - most of it is simply about which name is on an account or pension, or who's registered as the higher earner for child benefit. It's worth a five-minute check even if your situation feels straightforward, since these thresholds shift periodically.
Want to make sure your household is making the most of the allowances available to you? A Bippit coach can help you understand what could apply to your situation.
Before 1908, growing old in Britain without savings or family to support you often meant one place: the workhouse. There was no state safety net for the elderly at all until H.H. Asquith's Liberal government passed the Old Age Pensions Act in 1908, paying out from January 1909. It wasn't generous by design - 5 shillings a week for a single pensioner and 7 shillings 6 pence for a married couple, worth roughly Ā£23 and Ā£37 today - and it only applied to British subjects over 70 with a clean record and very little other income. Even so, nearly 600,000 pensions were paid out within the first year, most of them to women. From there it evolved through various National Insurance Acts into the contributory system weāre familiar with today.
It's a useful reminder of how recent - and how deliberate - the idea of a guaranteed income in old age actually is. The 1908 pension was set deliberately low, specifically to encourage people to save for their own retirement rather than rely on the state, and more than a century later that basic tension hasn't gone away: the State Pension alone, even at today's much higher rate, is rarely enough on its own to fund the retirement most people picture for themselves - it's designed as a foundation, not the whole plan.
It's also a reminder of how much the rules can shift over time: eligibility, age and generosity have all changed repeatedly over the last 116 years, and there's no guarantee today's triple lock or state pension age (already legislated to keep rising) will look the same by the time younger workers reach it. It's worth treating your own pension planning as something to actively build on top of the state pension, rather than plan entirely around it.
āWorth knowing:ā
The state pension age has shifted dramatically too - it was 70 for everyone in 1908, dropped to 65 for men and 60 for women through the 20th century, and is now equalised at 66, legislated to rise to 67 by 2028.ā
The energy price cap is rising again - up 3.6% from Thursday 1 October, taking the typical dual-fuel bill on direct debit from Ā£1,663 to Ā£1,723 a year, an increase of about Ā£60. It would have been worse: the government has scrapped VAT on electricity (though not gas) for six months from 1 October, which took the rise down to 3.6%. Gas is driving most of the increase - the unit rate is up 8.7% - while electricity unit rates are up only slightly and the electricity standing charge has actually fallen.
If you're currently on your supplier's standard variable tariff (the one that moves with the price cap), it's worth checking fixed-rate deals now rather than waiting - the cheapest fixes currently sit at around 7% below today's cap and roughly 10% below the new October rate, meaning you can lock in savings compared to where prices are heading either way. If you're already on a good fixed deal, standard practice is to do the opposite: don't cancel it early to chase a new one, since exit penalties usually wipe out any saving - it's really only worth actively shopping around if you've got 50 days or less left on your current fix, are on a standard variable tariff, or your fix is about to end anyway.
āNot sure whether fixing your energy tariff now could save you money? A Bippit coach can help you look at your household costs and work out what makes sense for your budget.
My partner stays at home to look after our children and isnāt earning at the moment - are we missing out on anything by only having one income going into savings and pensions?
Quite possibly, yes - and the good news is most of what you're missing is straightforward to put right. The clearest one: your partner can still pay up to Ā£2,880 a year into their own pension, and even with no earnings at all, the government adds 20% tax relief on top, turning it into Ā£3,600 - a free uplift that has nothing to do with whether or not they're working. It's particularly worth doing if you're already maxing out your own pension allowance, since it effectively gives your household a second allowance to use.
Beyond pensions, it's worth checking whose name savings and investments sit in. If you hold anything outside pensions and ISAs - shares, funds, a second property - having it in your partner's name rather than yours can mean paying capital gains tax at 18% instead of 24%, and dividend tax at 10.75% instead of 39.35%, simply because their income sits in a lower tax band than yours.
And don't forget your partner has their own Ā£20,000 ISA allowance too, even without an income - you can gift money into it and use up both of your allowances, rather than just yours.
My suggestion: depending on your situation, you could consider thinking of your household's tax position as one shared pot with two names on it, rather than just "my income, my accounts." A short review - who's named where, and whether anything like child benefit tapering applies to you - is usually enough to find one or two things worth changing. And if you want a proper walkthrough of your specific numbers, that's exactly what a coach can help with.
My partner isnāt earning at the moment, but we've never really thought about tax planning as a household - where would we even start?
How do I make sure I'm not relying too heavily on the state pension when I plan for retirement?
Is it worth switching to a fixed energy tariff now, or should I wait?
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