UK · England · 2026/27 tax year

The £100k Childcare Cliff Calculator

Cross £100,000 by a single pound and your family can lose every funded childcare hour and all of Tax-Free Childcare. See what it costs you, and the pension contribution that keeps it.

Your income
Your household
Your position
—
The £100,000 test — applied to each parent
What is at stake each year
Your escape route

The numbers here are big enough to be worth getting right

A modest pension move can reclaim thousands in childcare and reinstate your allowance. If your income is variable (bonuses, commission, RSUs) it pays to plan the timing. Compare pension providers, or speak to a regulated adviser.

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The 60% Tax Trap →
The same £100k line, costing you your Personal Allowance. See the escape.
The Child Benefit Charge →
Over £60k, HMRC claws child benefit back too. See that charge.
The full HENRY Calculator →
Every high-earner threshold in one place, across ten tabs.
Why does earning £1 more cost so much?
Funded childcare and Tax-Free Childcare are a cliff edge, not a taper. At £99,999 of adjusted net income you keep everything; at £100,001 you can lose all of it. Because funded childcare for a young child is worth several thousand pounds a year, a small pay rise that tips you over can leave your household thousands worse off overall. It is one of the sharpest cliff edges in the UK system.
It is per parent, not per household?
Yes, and it catches people out. Each parent must independently be under £100,000. So two parents earning £99,000 each (£198,000 between them) keep full support, while a single earner on £101,000 loses it entirely. If one parent is over, lowering the other parent's income does not help — the over-threshold parent has to come down.
How does a pension contribution fix it?
Eligibility is judged on adjusted net income, which is income minus gross pension contributions and Gift Aid. Paying into a pension lowers that figure. Bring it back under £100,000 and your childcare entitlement and Personal Allowance are both restored. Between £100,000 and £125,140 the contribution is also relieved at roughly 60%, so it is unusually cheap. There is normally a term's grace before entitlement actually stops, which is the window to act.
Not financial advice. An educational estimate based on published rules for the 2026/27 tax year. Funded hours shown are the England scheme (Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland differ); Tax-Free Childcare is UK-wide. The cash value of a funded hour depends on your provider's rates and how many hours you use, so figures are indicative. Eligibility must be confirmed in advance with HMRC and both parents must be working and earning above the minimum. Check gov.uk or a qualified, FCA-regulated adviser before acting.