Skip to main content

Make Salary Tax Efficient





Pay attention to your pay structure to get more in hand and pay less taxes


When negotiating terms of employment with a propsective employer, we focus on in creasing CTC, without paying much attention to the salary structure. Though a high er CTC is an important aspect of salary negotiation, it is equally important to structure it well to maximize take-home pay and minimize tax outgo. While you may not have complete control over the way your salary is structured, employers today are flexible enough to design it your way. However, before taking a final call on a particular pay structure, consider your long-term and short-term financial goals. Modifying the tax structure can simultaneously impact your net take home and your retirement corpus as some components of the package may not come to you immediately and others may be either full taxable or tax-free.Generally the CTC can be broadly divided in four components--basic, allowances, perquisites and retirement benefits contributions. Each component is treated in a different way for tax purposes and can impact your tax liability.

1 BASIC SALARY

It is vital to decide how much of your CTC should make up the basic salary, because it is fully taxable. If the basic is too high, your tax liability will shoot up. Other components of salary exemptions, such as the HRA and Provident Fund benefits, are linked to basic pay. Designing a tax efficient pay structure is always a trade-off between higher take home and maximum tax benefits.

Junior employees need a higher monthly payout. They can get that by opting for a lower basic salary and adding other fixed allowances in the salary structure such as food allowance, medical reimbursement, conveyance allowance, telephone, etc. These allowances are fixed and payable monthly. Employees may get taxed on these to a certain extent, but at a lower rate.

Senior employees fall in a higher tax bracket. For them, tax savings gets priority over a higher take-home salary. Hence, a higher basic salary would fetch additional tax benefits for such individuals.

2 ALLOWANCE

The Income Tax Act has prescribed certain allowances for all salaried individuals which are exempt at source. So if these allowances are a part of the pay structure, the overall tax liability may come down to a great extent.

3 PERQUISITES

The additional benefits or amenities provided by the employer to an employee are termed as perquisites. The Income Tax Act allows exemption for certain perquisites which if included as component of salary can result in tax savings.

4 RETIREMENT BENEFITS CONTRIBUTIONS

The fourth and the most important component of any salary structure is the retirement benefit contribution which is not payable to the employee immediately and is in the nature of long-term savings for them. While these savings help them lead a dignified life post-retirement, they also result in a lower take home package. It is important to decide the right ratio for these contributions. To motivate individuals to save more towards building a good retirement corpus, tax laws allow certain exemptions and deductions for these contributions.

Be diligent while designing your pay structure. Use the table alongside to plan the perfect salary structure.










Invest Rs 1,50,000 and Save Tax up to Rs 46,350 under Section 80C. Get Great Returns by Investing in Best Performing ELSS Funds. Save Tax Get Rich

Top 10 Tax Saver Mutual Funds for 2017 - 2018

Best 10 ELSS Mutual Funds to Invest in India for 2017

1. DSP BlackRock Tax Saver Fund

2. Tata India Tax Savings Fund 

3. Birla Sun Life Tax Relief 96

4. ICICI Prudential Long Term Equity Fund

5. Invesco India Tax Plan

6. Franklin India TaxShield 

7. Reliance Tax Saver (ELSS) Fund

8. BNP Paribas Long Term Equity Fund

9. Axis Tax Saver Fund

10. Sundaram Diversified Equity Fund



Invest in Best Performing 2017 Tax Saver Mutual Funds Online

Invest Best Tax Saver Mutual Funds Online

Download Top Tax Saver Mutual Funds Application Forms


For further information contact SaveTaxGetRich on 94 8300 8300

OR

You can write to us at

Invest [at] SaveTaxGetRich [dot] Com

OR

Call us on 94 8300 8300





Popular posts from this blog

Mutual Fund Review: Religare Tax Plan

Tax Plan is one of the better performing schemes from Religare Asset Management. Existing investors can redeem their investment after three years. But given the scheme's performance, they can continue to stay invested   Given the mandated lock-in period of three years, tax saving schemes give the fund manager the leeway to invest in ideas that may take time to nurture. Religare Tax Plan's investment ideas revolve around 'High Growth', which the fund manager has aimed to achieve by digging out promising stories/businesses in the mid-cap segment. Within the space, consumer staples has been the centre of attention for the last couple of years and can be seen as one of the key reasons for the scheme's outperformance as compared to the broader market. It has, however, tweaked its focus and reduced exposure in midcaps as they were commanding a high premium. The strategy seems to have worked as it returned a 22% gain last year. Religare Tax Plan has outperformed BSE 100...
Read more

Mutual Fund Review: L&T MIP

        This fund won't deliver chart-topping returns. However, over the long run it will not disappoint and end up beating the category average The fund has seen numerous changes at the helm. When Katare took over in October 2007, he made dramatic alterations to the portfolio. On the equity side, he increased the number of stocks to 11 (November) from 2 (September). On the debt side, he added Certificates of Deposit (CDs), while earlier Treasury Bills (T-Bills) and cash accounted for 88 per cent (September 2007) of the portfolio. In November 2007 he exited T-Bills for good. The results impressed. In the last quarter of 2007, it delivered 12.83 per cent (category average: 6.12%). In 2008, the first quarter performance was nothing short of impressive, a return of 9.93 per cent (category average: -3.97%). While other players increased their portfolio maturity, Katare maintained a low maturity profile. While the average maturity of the category was 2.81 years that quarter, th...
Read more

Reconfigure investments to reap benefits in DTC

    Investing for tax benefits under the new Direct Taxes Code ( DTC ) will be different in several ways from what taxpayers are familiar with right now. This will require some reconfiguration in the nature of investments for the investor and they need to be ready to tackle the changes that will come about once the new DTC is implemented from financial year 2012-13.One area of interest for most taxpayers is the manner in which they can extract the maximum tax benefit. Here is a look at the situation and also how it changes from the existing position. Basic deduction: At present, there is a deduction of Rs 1 lakh that is available for an individual when they make investments under specified areas such as provident fund, public provident fund, national savings certificates, equity linked savings scheme and insurance premium, among others. This benefit is available under Section 80C of the Income Tax Act. This has been replaced by a new Section 68 under the DTC where there is a deduct...
Read more

ICICI Prudential Balanced Fund

 ICICI Prudential Balanced Fund scheme seeks to generate long-term capital appreciation and current income by investing in a portfolio that is investing in equities and related securities as well as fixed income and money market securities. The approximate allocation to equity would be in the range of 60-80 per cent with a minimum of 51 per cent, and the approximate debt allocation is 40-49 per cent, with a minimum of 20 per cent. An impressive show in the last couple of years has propelled this fund from a three-star to a four-star rating. The fund has traditionally featured a high equity allocation, hovering at well over 70 per cent, which is higher than the allocations of the peers. But in the last one year, the allocation has been moderated from 78-79 per cent levels to 66-67 per cent of the portfolio. ICICI Prudential Balanced Fund appears to practise some degree of tactical allocation based on market valuations. Within equities, well over two-thirds of the allocation is parked i...
Read more

Mutual Funds: Past Performance is not just everything

Many a times your agent / distributor / relationship manager tries to push you some mutual fund schemes by enticing you with a typical sales pitch…"Sir, this scheme has generated 20% returns in the past one year." And this sales pitch often gets louder when the market conditions have been favourable. Some of the agents / distributors / relationship managers have another unique way of luring you. They say, "Sir / madam this scheme has been awarded the best scheme award in the past by a leading business channel"... And hearing all these sales talks you investors very often get attracted and sign a cheque in favour of the respective scheme.   But please ask yourself do you hear these sales talks when the capital markets turn turbulent? Why is it so that your agent / distributor / relationship manager avoids talking to you during turbulent times of the capital markets and doesn't boast about returns generated by the respective funds or awards being conferred on t...
Read more
Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...
Invest in Tax Saving Mutual Funds Download Any Applications
Transact Mutual Funds Online Invest Online
Buy Gold Mutual Funds Invest Now