If you are a GP, hospital doctor or consultant, you want to know what the Budget means for your income and day-to-day work. The main points to review are practice staffing costs, the trading allowance and the cost of driving for work. If you are planning to leave a practice or sell a medical business, there is also a change to check.
1. Check your staffing costs
GP partnerships should plan around the announced £13.21 minimum hourly rate for workers aged 21 or older beginning 1 April 2027. Pay floors for younger employees and some apprentices differ.
If you are a GP partner employing receptionists, healthcare assistants or other practice staff, allow for the higher minimum wage in your budget. Check how it affects your whole team, including experienced staff whose pay is above the minimum. Add the practice’s National Insurance and pension costs to see the full cost.
If you are a salaried GP or hospital doctor, this staffing point is mainly relevant if you also run a business and employ staff.
2. Could the trading allowance help you?
Doctors with modest independent earnings should be aware of the proposal to increase the annual trading allowance from £1,000 to £3,000 on 6 April 2027. If enacted, qualifying self-employment income up to the threshold could be free of income tax.
For doctors, this may be worth checking if you earn a small amount from independent teaching, occasional private work or self-employed locum sessions. It does not apply to your salary or your share of GP partnership profits. Payments from your employer or certain businesses linked to you can also be excluded.
A doctor cannot offset both the trading allowance and actual deductible expenses against the same receipts. Consider the relative value of each method, including any eligible travel costs.
As a doctor, you may already pay for professional cover, subscriptions and other work costs. Compare the allowance with the business expenses you could otherwise claim. The allowance may not be the better choice.
Keep your practice income forecast realistic
If you are a GP partner, base your plans on the funding your practice has actually been awarded. A national NHS spending announcement does not, on its own, tell you how much more your surgery will receive.
Mileage, future plans and your next steps
3. Keep track of your business mileage
For qualifying journeys in a personally owned car or van, the figures stated for 2026/27 are 55p per mile for the first 10,000 business miles and 25p thereafter. From 6 April 2027, a proposed rule would keep the initial rate and increase the rate above 10,000 miles to 35p, subject to legislation.
As a GP, you may drive to see patients or work at more than one surgery. As a consultant, you may travel between hospitals. Some of these journeys may qualify, but working at several sites does not make every journey claimable. Travel from home to your regular workplace will usually not qualify.
A contemporaneous travel log should identify the clinical purpose, date, origin, destination, mileage and reimbursements.
An employed clinician whose employer reimburses below the approved mileage amount may be entitled to relief on the difference, not a cash repayment of the full rate. Self-employed clinicians who qualify to use mileage-based deductions instead reduce their taxable profits. Company vehicles follow other rules.
4. Planning to sell your practice or business?
If you are a GP partner planning to retire, leave your partnership, ask for advice before agreeing the sale. Surgery premises you own personally may need a separate check.
For doctors disposing of a qualifying business interest, Business Asset Disposal Relief may lower capital gains tax. The announced plan reduces the lifetime qualifying-gains cap from £1 million to £500,000 for sales from 6 April 2027, with an 18% rate applying to eligible gains. This reduction is not yet enacted.
The relief has specific qualifying tests, and the date of a transaction may not be determined simply by when papers are signed. Obtain advice before changing a GP partnership exit timetable.
5. Higher Tax on Rental Income — Important for GP Partners Owning Surgery Premises
Among the Autumn Budget measures relevant to GP partners is the planned rise in Income Tax charged on property earnings.
Effective from 6 April 2027, taxable rental profits will attract rates of 24%, 44% and 49%, according to the taxpayer’s income band. Each rate is four percentage points above its existing equivalent.
The implications could be substantial for doctors who hold surgery buildings in their own names and lease the premises to their GP practice. Former partners who have retired from clinical practice but continue to collect rent from surgery properties they still own may also come within the scope of the changes.
It is essential, however, to distinguish between genuine rental receipts and notional rent reimbursement. Payments received by a GP partnership under notional rent arrangements are generally accounted for as practice trading income, rather than personal property income. Consequently, such receipts would not automatically become subject to the revised property income rates.
GPs may have additional exposure through privately held buy-to-let accommodation or other rental investments, regardless of whether those assets are connected to their medical practice.
As an indication of the potential financial effect, £30,000 in taxable rental profits falling within the higher-rate band could result in £1,200 of additional annual Income Tax compared with the existing 40% rate.
Ahead of the April 2027 implementation date, GP partners and other medical professionals earning rental income should consider the implications for their property holdings, anticipated tax payments and longer-term financial planning.
What should you do now?
- GP partners: update the staff budget and check how much you can safely take from the practice.
- Doctors with private or locum work: compare the trading allowance with your expenses.
- Keep a clear mileage log and check which journeys count.
Speak to SIAL Accountants about your GP practice, medical income or locum work. Visit www.sial-accountants.co.uk.
General information as at 28 October 2026. Announced changes may change before they become law. What you can claim depends on your circumstances.