About the Plan

  • You pay core contributions of 3%, 4%, 5% or 6% of your pensionable earnings each year, and can change your contribution rate on 1 April annually.
  • ITV matches your core contribution plus an extra 3%.
  • You can pay extra contributions to boost your savings.

  • When you join, provided it’s your first opportunity to join, ITV may invite you to backdate your contributions to kick start your ITV DC savings - you’ll have 3 months to decide.

  • You get valuable tax relief on your contributions which saves you money.

Find out more

Core contributions

  • You can choose to pay 3%, 4%, 5%, or 6% of your pensionable earnings as core contributions. In return, ITV will also contribute. Here’s how it works.
If you contribute… + ITV will top up your savings by an extra… = The total you’d be saving would be…
3% + 6% = 9%
4% + 7% = 11%
5% + 8% = 13%
6% + 9% = 15%
  • If you participate in the ITV DC Plan through salary sacrifice, you don’t pay contributions directly to the Plan. Instead, what happens is that your basic salary is reduced by the amount of your core contributions, and ITV pays your core contributions for you, as well as its own contributions. Participating in this way means that most members pay less national insurance.
  • If you decide not to participate through salary sacrifice, your contributions will be deducted from your basic salary and you won’t benefit from these extra national insurance savings.

A tax-efficient way to save

Whether or not you participate in the ITV DC Plan through salary sacrifice, you get tax savings on your contributions up to certain limits. So the actual reduction you’ll see in your take-home pay will be less.

  • If you pay basic-rate tax (20%), a contribution of £100 would reduce your take-home pay by only £80
  • If you pay higher-rate tax (40%), a contribution of £100 would reduce your take-home pay by £60
  • If you pay additional-rate tax (45%), a contribution of £100 would reduce your take-home pay by £55

Your pension tax allowances


The ITV DC Plan is a tax-registered pension scheme. This means that HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) places allowances on the amount of retirement savings you can make each year and build up over your working life and still benefit from tax savings.

You’re responsible for monitoring how your retirement benefits from all pension schemes measure against these allowances, so it’s important to make sure you understand how these allowances may affect you. ITV Pensions can help you understand how your benefits are building up, but if you’d like advice about saving tax efficiently for retirement you'll need to speak to an impartial financial adviser. Below is an overview of the tax allowances.

Annual Allowance
This is the amount of retirement savings you can build up tax efficiently in any tax year.

The standard Annual Allowance for the 2020/21 tax year is £40,000. However, the Annual Allowance will reduce if your ‘Adjusted Income’ exceeds £240,000 in a tax year. Your Adjusted Income includes all your UK taxable income (such as salary, bonus and other taxable benefits, bank interest, dividend income and taxable rental income), plus any pension contributions made by you and your employer. For every £1 of Adjusted Income over £240,000, the Annual Allowance will reduce by 50p from £40,000 to a minimum of £4,000. If you think you may be affected please contact ITV Pensions to discuss further.

Currently, any allowances you do not use in one year can be carried forward for up to 3 years.

All retirement savings made into UK registered pension schemes for the period 6 April to 5 April are measured against the Annual Allowance. This includes:

  • any contribution you and your employer make to the ITV DC Plan, including extra contributions;
  • contributions you or any employer have made to other registered defined contribution pension arrangements such as personal pensions; and
  • broadly, the increase in the capital value over the 12-month period of any defined benefit (DB) pension you may have, although not all increases in value count. For example, increases to any ITV deferred DB pension would not count.

Any retirement savings you make above the Annual Allowance will be subject to the Annual Allowance charge. The amount of tax you would have to pay depends on the income tax rate that applies to you.

Money purchase Annual Allowance
If you take any defined contribution savings (including savings you’ve built up by paying extra contributions) as cash (other than the 25% tax-free cash sum) or through flexible drawdown, or you exceed the income limit for capped drawdown, you’ll have a lower Annual Allowance (called your Money Purchase Annual Allowance) of £4,000 from April 2017. This allowance applies to both your own and ITV’s contributions and any other contributions paid on your behalf. You won’t be able to carry forward any unused allowance for the previous 3 tax years. If you’re currently contributing to the ITV DC Plan and access defined contribution savings from another pension scheme in this way, you need to let ITV Pensions know within 91 days of accessing your benefits that the reduced Annual Allowance applies.

The Lifetime Allowance
This is an allowance on the amount of retirement benefits you can build up tax efficiently over your lifetime. It includes retirement benefits you’ve built up away from ITV but excludes any State benefits and any pension benefits you’ve not built up in your own right (for example spouse’s pension). For the 2019/20 tax year, the Lifetime Allowance is £1,073,100.

All retirement savings from UK registered pension schemes are measured against the Lifetime Allowance. This includes:

  • the value of your ITV DC savings at retirement and any other defined contribution benefits you have built up
  • the capital value of any pension payable from a defined benefit pension arrangement (this is your annual pension at retirement times an HMRC factor of 20); and
  • any cash sums payable from a defined benefit pension arrangement.

Any retirement savings in excess of the Lifetime Allowance will be subject to the Lifetime Allowance charge. This is 25% for any excess benefits taken as pension (this applies in addition to any income tax deducted from your pension under PAYE) and 55% for benefits paid as a lump sum.

You’re responsible for monitoring how your pension benefits from all pension schemes measure up against these allowances. ITV Pensions can help you understand how your benefits build up but if you would like advice about saving tax efficiently for retirement you’ll need to speak to an impartial financial adviser.

Extra contributions

  • You can pay more than 6% of your pensionable earnings into the ITV DC Plan if you want to boost your savings. These are called extra contributions.
  • ITV doesn't match your extra contributions, but you'll still get tax savings on them up to HMRC's allowances (see details in 'Core contributions' above). Your extra contributions are made automatically through salary sacrifice which means that most members pay less National Insurance.
  • You can start, stop or change how much you pay as extra contributions from month to month.