My wife recently got a job here, so we’ve figured out some of the steps and issues that go along with working. As with most things international, UKCOSA has a good summary of information about international students and family working in the UK.
Based on the UK student visa rules, the student can work up to 20 hours per week during term and full-time during the breaks. Some schools also limit the hours you can work further. However, I wouldn’t recommend coming expecting to do much because with a 3 year program, there’s not much extra time to do other things. Also, in one’s second and third year tutoring and lecturing options are usually available to students, which bring in extra income (though probably not much). The spouse of a student can work full-time without any restrictions. The UK is much more flexible than the US because the student and spouse are not limited to just working at the university. Most spouses that we know who have found a job, started with a temp agency and then found a permanent position through there. Others found positions related to their experience and training through various means. My wife just applied directly at a local retail store.
Once one finds a job, you have to apply for a National Insurance Number (NINO), similar to the SSN in the US, through the Department for Work and Pensions. You have to make an appointment the DWP’s Jobcentre Plus to give them your documents for them to give you a number. For Durham, the interview will take place in Newcastle. The office is about a 5 min walk from the train station. While they note a large list of items needed to verify your eligibility to work in the UK, all they asked of my wife (and others we talked to) at the meeting was her passport and a letter from her employer explaining the terms of employment. Until you get the NINO, they just take out an ’emergency’ rate of tax. Once you get the number, they’ll true up the taxes withheld. (However, the UK system is not like the IRS because you don’t true up taxes at the end of the year on April 15. What they take out is what you pay.)
Also, there is relatively recent news regarding working in the UK once you graduate. From 2006 all international students graduating from postgraduate courses taught in the UK will be able to apply to work in the UK for up to a year after graduation. These new provisions apply to students who have started their courses on or after 1 May 2006. Rather confusingly, this scheme is sometimes referred to as the “Science and Engineering Graduates Scheme” but the provision now extends to graduates of ALL postgraduate courses whether related to science and engineering or not.
For further information: Post-grads Working in the UK, Full details…
Dunelm Road 
Saturday, 28 April 2007 at 10:07 pm
If you don’t mind me asking, about how much can someone make working at a local retail store?
John
Saturday, 28 April 2007 at 10:20 pm
Her job starts at £5.50, which I believe is pretty close to minimum wage if not at it. By June, they said she’ll move up to £6. I believe taxes withheld are just under 20% but her final tax bracket hasn’t been worked out yet, and we expecte it to be a few % lower than that once it does.
Sunday, 29 April 2007 at 8:27 am
As of Tue, there will be a new visa scheme where all international graduates of UK programs will be able stay for a year (as I understand it): http://www.workingintheuk.gov.uk/working_in_the_uk/en/homepage/schemes_and_programmes/internationalgraduatesscheme.html
Fortunate, for those of us who started after the cut off date for the expanded “science and engineering” scheme!
Monday, 30 April 2007 at 5:50 am
Ben
I’ve had conversations with a number of potential postgrads from North America over the last couple of years and your blog is a really helpful service that I have referred a couple to recently – thanks!
Here’s some technical stuff on the Tax System for you:
This HM Government Revenue and Customs (=IRS) page gives the tax rates for UK tax http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/rates/it.htm The UK tax year runs from April 5th to April 5th each year (because the new Year used to be on the Feast of the Annunication – March 25th – and then they took days out of the calendar in 1752 – don’t go there). The system works by banding providing an individual tax free amount of £5225 (April 07- April 08 Tax Year) and then 10%, 22% and 40% bands for varying amounts above that. Additional allowances exist for specific conditions (age, blindness etc.).
The Tax Code each person is given by their employer reflects their annual tax free allowance divided by 10 and then shortened to three digits (for most people 522 = £5225). This (and the amounts for each band) is then divided by 52 for weekly paid workers or 12 for month paid to give a tax free amount (and amounts taxed at each rate) for each pay period.
Tax is levied by your employer on a Pay As You Earn (PAYE) basis in each pay period and you only need complete a ‘squaring away’ tax return at the end of the tax year if your income is more complicated – if for example it comes from more than one source, you have income from investments etc.. Small year on year adjustments in income tax can be passed on in the tax code. If I earn £500 more than expected in this tax year, for example, the HMR&C will just take that amount from next years tax code to reclaim the tax through PAYE and save collecting lots of small amouts of money.
Incidentally this all means that if people arrive in the UK in the Autumn and start earning before the next April (let’s say 5 November, so that 5 November to 4 April is 5 months or 5/12 of the year), then the weekly/monthly Tax Free amount (and thereafter the tax bands) for the year has already been accumlating and you get more generous tax treatment in the first 5 months. This is because the £5335 is in fact being divided not by 12 months of pay periods but by 5 months of pay periods(November – April). In effect you can earn over £1000 (£5335/5) tax free per month from November to April rather than the £440(=£5335/12)tax free if you worked the whole tax year.
Three corrolaries:
It’s worth getting a job before April and trying to use up that tax free allowance for the half year before the next April! It wouldn’t affect a person eaning the minimum wage for only half time work because they wouldn’t quite earn enough in a full year to pay any tax (they’s be under the £5335 tax threshold). But for any one else, a professional or just someone expecting to working at £6 an hour for say 38 hours a week for 45 weeks of the year (=£10,000 per annum), you pay less tax for the first half year than after the next April.
Secondly, as you said on the main blog this only kicks in when you are moved from the initial ’emergency’ tax code to the correct one. Then suddenly you get some back tax in your pay – like a small bonus.
Thirdly but also it means that in the April after a person first starts earning they find that their pay often falls a bit. This is because they move into the new tax year and now the tax free allowance each month is being spread over the whole tax year. Most UK pay rises (salaray scale increments and cost of living rises) are made in April of each year and can diguise this to some degree, but to new earners (like most UK graduates who also start new jobs in the Autumn) it can come as a shock to suddenly be earning less for the same work come the April and May after they start work.
Official information on the UK minimum wage is on a govenment website, here: http://www.dti.gov.uk/employment/pay/national-minimum-wage/index.html It’s currently £5.35 for what my kids still call ‘grown ups’.
Best wishes
Mark
Monday, 30 April 2007 at 9:50 am
Thanks Mark! That’s good stuff to know. I’m glad to get some local input to give an extra bit of detail that I wouldn’t know about.
Wednesday, 15 August 2007 at 5:53 pm
Ben,
Did your wife have to get a “work permit” or was her visa considered as the work permit? Besides getting the NINO, was there anything else she had to do in order to work? Thanks!
Wednesday, 15 August 2007 at 8:32 pm
She had a standard spouse-dependent visa, and that’s all she needed, then just the NINO.