IRIS Cascade system updates for payroll year-end 2024/25

Rate changes

Legislative rates for the 2025/2026 tax year have been updated on the following screens to match the information provided by HMRC:

  • Apprenticeship Levy

  • Employment Allowance

  • National Insurance

  • Postgraduate Loans

  • Shared Parental Pay

  • Statutory Adoption Pay

  • Statutory Maternity Pay

  • Statutory Parental Bereavement Pay

  • Statutory Paternity Pay

  • Statutory Sick Pay

  • Student Loan

  • Tax

Under Maintenance > Legislation you can view the new rates that come into effect for the 2025/2026 tax year after completing year-end.

Tax

We have updated Tax code formats and calculations.

National Insurance

We have updated National Insurance rates,thresholds and calculations.

 

Significant changes to National Insurance were announced by the government during the Autumn Budget for tax year 2025/26

 

  • An increase in the Employers National Insurance percentage rate for most NI categories

  • A reduction to the Secondary Threshold, which is the threshold used for the Employers National Insurance calculation

 

The reduction to the Secondary Threshold means this is now a value below the Lower Earnings Limit (LEL).

To accommodate for this change, the following updates have been made in Cascade:

 

The following fields have been removed from Employee NI Records, NI History and Manual Overrides:

 

  • Earnings to LEL

  • Earnings LEL to PT

 

The following fields have been added to Employee NI Records and Manual Overrides:

 

  • Up to ST

  • At ST

  • ST to LEL

 

The following fields have been added to NI History

 

  • Earnings to ST

  • Earnings at ST

  • Earnings ST To LEL

 

The rate and thresholds values for 2025/26 can be found here: Rates and thresholds for employers 2025 to 2026 - GOV.UK

 

 

FPS changes

We have updated the FPS in line with HMRC specifications for the 2025/2026 tax year. These changes do not affect any FPS relating to the 2024/2025 tax year.

EPS changes

We have updated the EPS in line with HMRC specifications for the 2025/2026 tax year. These changes will not affect any EPS relating to the 2024/2025 tax year.

Automatic enrolment

To reflect the new HMRC/TPR rates for the 2025/2026 tax year, we have updated the Auto Enrolment thresholds in Admin > Auto Enrolment > Qualifying Earning Thresholds.

Workplace Postcode

From April 2025, HMRC will reject an FPS if a Freeport or Investment Zone NIC category letter is reported for an employment but does not contain the workplace postcode for any qualifying employees. The workplace postcode for any qualifying employee must be located within a designated special tax site.

A new item has been added to Employee Details > Real Time Information for Workplace Postcode.

The Workplace Postcode field will need to be populated for any employee on the following NI Letters: D, E, F, I, K, L, N & S.

Enter the postcode of the site where the employee works.

More information can be found here.

Lifetime Allowance

In addition to the three existing indicators for the pension drawdown type, two more will be introduced in relation to LTA changes:

  • Pension Commencement Excess Lump Sum (PCELS)

  • Stand Alone Lump Sum (SALS)

In IRIS Cascade Payroll, these new indicators can be selected from Application Data > Pay Elements > Earnings > RTI > Pension Payment type.

The Pension Payment type selected will be populated on the FPS if a payment has been calculated using the element.

Scottish Earnings Arrestment

Following a Scottish Government review, the statutory tables for Scottish Earnings Arrestment have been updated. Although scheduled to change once every 3 years – the last one being 2023 – a change has been made to bring in new rates 1 year early.

The new Scottish 2025 rate can be selected from Application Data > Court Orders > Payment Table.