Universal Credit
Universal Credit for any household, worked out month by month from its needs and its earnings. Amounts are a month unless they say otherwise.
Family and childcare
What childcare support your family can get, what is at stake at £100,000 of adjusted net income, and what each route to keeping it costs.
Who are you most like?
Pick the closest. Every figure is exact for that household; then change the salary, or make the numbers your own.
How this works
- Pick someone like you, or type your own figures. Nothing you type leaves this page.
- See what you keep of your pay and where the rest goes, then move the salary slider.
- See the moves that change it most, the working behind them, and keep a plan.
Every rate comes from GOV.UK and is listed under About the numbers; every figure is checked against the verified workbook. This is information to take to your payroll, pension provider or an adviser, not financial advice.
More starting points
SUE
Pre-HENRY
HENRY
Free school meals are not yet valued outside England.
Show where the pay goes as a table
What if the salary were different?
Type a figure such as 18k or 18,000. The charts and the slider stretch to include any salary you type.
Kept only in this browser's storage, on this device; untick to clear.
Your situation
Your own figures. Everything on the page follows them; the salary is set with the slider below. Amounts are for the whole year unless they say a month.
Show the working
The lever
Check your payslip: a pension taken before tax is a net pay arrangement; one taken after tax is relief at source. While you claim Universal Credit, the two cost you different amounts.
Information, not financial advice.
This year, at this salary
Month by month
Universal Credit is worked out each month on that month's pay. Enter a bonus, shares or savings to see each month. After a month that ends the award, a new claim each month is assumed: the best case.
How Universal Credit is worked out
What you keep of each extra £100
Move along the chart with a mouse or finger, or select it and use the arrow keys. Each numbered line is listed under "Where things change".
Show the chart as a table
Where things change
Share of pay taken, overall
Your plan
Keep these figures
Who can help
Terms of use and privacy
Terms of use
SUE and HENRY is an information tool. It shows what UK income tax, National Insurance, student loan repayments, the Child Benefit charge, pension rules, childcare support and Universal Credit do to a household's pay in the 2026 to 2027 tax year, using rates taken from GOV.UK and listed under About the numbers with the date each was checked. It is not financial, investment, tax or benefits advice, and it does not recommend any product, provider or course of action; the figures are illustrations of the rules, worked out exactly for the facts entered, and a household's real position can differ for reasons the page does not ask about. Decisions, and any action taken on them, remain yours; regulated advice is available from an authorised financial adviser, and free guidance from MoneyHelper and Citizens Advice. The page is provided as it is, without warranty, and its author accepts no liability for loss arising from its use; it is checked against a verified workbook and its sources, and errors found can be reported to feedback@sueandhenry.com.
Privacy
The figures you enter never leave your device: every calculation runs in your browser, the page sends nothing to any server, and no cookies are set. If you tick "Remember my figures on this device", the figures are kept in this browser's own storage on this device only, where you can clear them by unticking the box; nothing is copied anywhere else. The site counts visits in aggregate (pages, country, device type, browser) using Cloudflare Web Analytics, which uses no cookies and no identifiers, and records which starting point, salary band, nation and step were used, as counts in bands with no individual record — nothing that could identify you or your figures. If you email us or send a plan to yourself, that content is yours and leaves through your own email app; what we receive we keep only to correspond with you and improve the page. If you choose to join a mailing list, your email address is used only for the updates you asked for, with an unsubscribe link in every message. Questions to hello@sueandhenry.com.
About the numbers
Marks: ◇ changes each year; ✱ changed recently; ⚠ a change is announced or the figure is uncertain; § fixed in law. "Checked" is when it was last compared with its source.
Re-runs 530 checks of this page's calculations against figures recorded from the verified workbook, here in your browser.