End of tax year ‘To-Do’ checklist

The end of the financial tax year is fast approaching (5th April) and time is almost up to complete those tax year sensitive tasks. The end of the tax year is of particular significance when managing your finances and investments and offers vital planning opportunities. Therefore, we have compiled an end of tax year checklist to help you get your finances in order and make the most of the available tax breaks for the 2025/26 tax year.

Pensions

• Pay into your pension – pensions offer a tax-efficient way to invest for your retirement. Your pension fund grows tax-free and any contributions you make into the plan also receive income tax relief at your highest marginal rate. But you cannot access your pension fund until you are 55 (rising to 57 from April 2028). You receive tax relief on any contributions up to 100% of your earnings (capped at the current Annual Allowance of £60,000) or £3,600 if you have no earnings, whichever is greater. Making pension contributions can lower your income tax bill, restore lost personal allowances or help you avoid the High Income Child Benefit Charge.
• Carry forward pension contributions - unused pension contribution Annual Allowances can be carried forward, and used, from the previous 3 years, provided you have maximised your £60,000 allowance for the current year.
• Pay into your spouse’s pension – even non-earners can get tax relief on pension contributions. A non-earner can pay £2,880 each tax year into a pension and receive an additional £720 top-up from HMRC.
• Pay into a Junior SIPP - contribute up to £2,880 per year into a Junior SIPP. In addition, the pension will attract an additional £720 in tax relief. Anyone can contribute towards a Junior SIPP, but only a parent or legal guardian can open one on behalf of a child.
• Boost your state pension by paying voluntary national insurance contributions - if you have gaps in your National Insurance (NI) record then you can make voluntary contributions in order to plug the gaps and boost your state pension. Note that the special extension allowing you to plug gaps back to 2006 ended in April 2025; you can now only plug gaps going back for the standard 6 previous tax years.
• Use a pension calculator - if you're unsure how much you need to be paying into your pension each month to be comfortable in your retirement, use our pension calculator to find out.

Investments

• Use your annual ISA allowance - you can shelter up to £20,000 this tax year in a Stocks and Shares ISA (also called an investment ISA), Cash ISA, Lifetime ISA (up to a maximum of £4,000) or an Innovative Finance ISA. But you must stay within the overall £20,000 limit. All income, interest or capital gains are tax-free within an ISA wrapper. Here is a roundup of the best cash ISA rates and best investment ISAs available at the moment. Don't forget that you can open more than one cash ISA or Stocks and Shares ISA in a tax year, just as long as your total contributions across all of them do not exceed your annual ISA allowance.
• Pay money into your child’s Junior ISA  - up to the maximum of £9,000 for the 2025/26 tax year. Unused allowances are lost at midnight on 5th April and can’t be carried over to the new tax year. Here is our roundup of the Best Stocks and Shares Junior ISAs.
• Utilise your Capital Gains Tax (CGT) allowance – if the value of your investments has increased enough during the current tax year to exceed the capital gains tax allowance of £3,000 for the 2025/26 tax year, you may want to consider selling enough of your assets to use that allowance, as well as consider splitting this over more than one tax year. You can also use some of the tax-saving tips in our article, "41 simple ways to pay less tax" - the article includes ways to use 'bed and spouse-ing' and 'bed and ISA-ing' to utilise your CGT allowance.
• Consider tax-incentivised investments - certain legitimate investments, such as Venture Capital Trusts (VCTs), attract generous tax reliefs, which are tax-year sensitive. However, these investments are high-risk and only suitable for sophisticated investors. But never make an investment just for tax reasons and always seek independent financial advice.

Tax

• Consider disposing of any capital losses to offset against capital gains made elsewhere which may otherwise be liable to capital gains tax. You can also carry forward excess capital losses but you must declare them on your tax return within four years.
• Consider taking dividends - the annual tax-free allowance for dividend income remains at just £500 for the 2025/26 tax year. If you own a limited company, ensure you are efficiently extracting profits to make use of this £500 zero-rate band.
• Marriage tax allowance - if your spouse has unused personal tax allowance then you may be able to use it by claiming a proportion of their income tax personal allowance. For 2025/26, up to £1,260 can be transferred, saving up to £252 in tax. Providing you met the criteria in previous years, you can backdate your claim for up to the 4 previous tax years. Our article ‘What is marriage tax allowance and how do you claim it’ explains this in more detail.
• Be generous and reduce your Inheritance Tax (IHT) bill – there are a number of annual IHT allowances which are tax-year sensitive. By using them you can reduce any potential IHT bill payable on your death. IHT is charged at 40% on estates over £325,000. Each tax year you can give away:
  • • £3,000 and if you don’t make full use of your exemption in one year you can carry it forward to the next year, for one year only.
    • up to £250 a person (but not in conjunction with any other inheritance tax allowance).
    • £5,000 to a child who is getting married and £2,500 to a grandchild or great-grandchild getting married.
    • regular gifts from income which are free of IHT. Size is irrelevant as long you can maintain your normal lifestyle after making them. But grandparents could use these to fund a pension for a grandchild which is obviously tax year sensitive.
    • For other ways to reduce your tax bill see my article how to avoid inheritance tax.