Work out part-time or term-time-only pay from a full-time salary — with holiday entitlement and hourly rate.
Source: GOV.UK — Holiday entitlement
By Konstantin Iakovlev · Founder, Calks.uk
Last updated: · Verified against HMRC and GOV.UK 2026/27 rates
Rates verified: 28 September 2026
Quick Answer
Pro-rata salary = full-time salary × (your hours ÷ full-time hours). On a £35,000 FTE salary, working 22.5 hours against a 37.5-hour week pays £21,000 a year. Term-time-only roles are also scaled by paid weeks: weeks worked plus statutory holiday (5.6 ÷ 46.4 of worked weeks), divided by 52.14.
Your Pro-Rata Salary
£21,000.00
60.0% of full-time · £1,750.00/month paid across 12 months
Monthly
£1,750.00
Weekly
£402.76
Hourly
£17.90
Statutory minimum holiday: 126 hours per year (5.6 weeks × 22.5 hours) — the same 5.6-week entitlement as full-time staff, pro-rated by your hours.
This is gross pay. See your net pay with the take-home pay calculator.
Disclaimer
This calculator is for guidance only. It is not financial or tax advice: check anything you rely on against the official source or a qualified adviser. Rates and figures come from HMRC and GOV.UK and are reviewed for the 2026/27 tax year. Everything is calculated in your browser; nothing you enter is sent to our servers.
How It Works
Job adverts often quote a full-time-equivalent (FTE) salary, meaning what the role would pay someone working full-time hours. If you work part-time, your actual salary is that FTE scaled by your hours, so you multiply it by your weekly hours and divide by the full-time week. A £35,000 pro rata role at 3 days a week, 22.5 of 37.5 hours, therefore pays £21,000. The word pro rata tells you nothing about the job itself, only that the headline number belongs to somebody working the full week.
Your hourly rate does not change. Part-time staff earn the same per hour as full-time colleagues in the same role, and what changes is the number of paid hours. Holiday entitlement scales the same way: the statutory minimum is 5.6 weeks for everyone, so a part-timer on 22.5 hours accrues 5.6 multiplied by 22.5, which is 126 hours of paid leave, rather than a smaller number of weeks.
Term-time-only (TTO) contracts, common for teaching assistants, school support staff and some childcare roles, add a second scaling factor in the form of paid weeks. You are paid for the weeks you work, typically 38 to 39 school weeks, plus accrued statutory holiday, calculated as 5.6 divided by 46.4 of the weeks worked, which comes to about 4.7 weeks on a 39-week year. Most local authorities then annualise the result, taking the FTE, applying the hours ratio and then multiplying by paid weeks divided by 52.14, and pay it in 12 equal monthly instalments so income stays steady across the school holidays.
Employers' exact TTO formulas vary slightly. Some divide by 52, and some pro-rate holiday above the statutory minimum from the full-time contract, which produces a different answer again. The calculation here uses the most common statutory approach, so treat the output as a close estimate rather than a payslip. Your contract or the school's pay policy will name the divisor actually used, and that is the document to go by if the two disagree.
Pro-rata pay is a gross figure, with tax, National Insurance and pension deductions applying as normal on top. Because the tax-free Personal Allowance and the National Insurance threshold do not shrink when your hours do, part-time take-home pay is proportionally higher than the salary ratio suggests. Auto-enrolment works the other way. The £10,000 trigger and the £6,240 lower earnings band are annual cash figures rather than proportions, so cutting your hours can drop you underneath them and stop pension contributions without any announcement. Check a payslip after any change to your working pattern.
Example: £35,000 FTE, 22.5 hours, term-time only (39 weeks)
- Hours ratio: 22.5 ÷ 37.5 = 0.60
- Holiday accrual: 39 × 5.6/46.4 = 4.71 weeks → paid weeks = 43.71
- Weeks ratio: 43.71 ÷ 52.14 = 0.838
- Salary: £35,000 × 0.60 × 0.838 = £17,603 a year
- Paid monthly: £17,603 ÷ 12 = £1,467/month, including through school holidays
Source: GOV.UK — Holiday entitlement
Frequently Asked Questions
- What does "pro rata" mean on a job advert?
- It means the advertised salary is the full-time-equivalent figure, and your actual pay will be scaled in proportion to the hours you work. If an advert says "£35,000 pro rata" and the full-time week is 37.5 hours, working 22.5 hours pays £21,000 a year. Your hourly rate is identical to a full-time colleague's, you are simply paid for fewer hours. Under the Part-time Workers Regulations 2000, part-time staff must not be treated less favourably per hour than comparable full-timers. Source: GOV.UK, ACAS.
- How is term-time-only (TTO) pay calculated?
- Term-time-only staff are paid for the weeks they actually work plus accrued statutory holiday, rather than the full year. Holiday is added at 5.6 divided by 46.4 of the weeks worked, so a 39-week school year accrues about 4.7 weeks and gives roughly 43.7 paid weeks. That figure is then divided by 52.14 and applied to your hours-adjusted salary. Divisors vary between employers, with 52, 52.14 and 52.143 all in use, so check your contract. Source: GOV.UK holiday entitlement guidance, local authority pay policies.
- How much holiday do part-time workers get?
- The statutory minimum is the same 5.6 weeks for everyone, and it scales with your working pattern rather than being reduced. Someone working 22.5 hours a week accrues 126 hours of paid holiday a year, and someone working 3 days a week gets 16.8 days. The entitlement is capped at 28 days for those working 6 or 7 days a week. If full-time staff get a more generous contractual package, say 30 days plus bank holidays, you are entitled to the same, pro-rated by your hours. Source: GOV.UK.
- Is take-home pay also proportional to hours?
- No, it is proportionally better for part-time workers. The tax-free Personal Allowance of £12,570 and the National Insurance threshold do not shrink when your hours do, so a larger share of a part-time salary escapes tax altogether. After income tax and NI at 2026/27 rates, a £35,000 full-time salary takes home about 82% of gross (£28,720), while the same role at 60% hours, paying £21,000, keeps about 89% (£18,640), before any pension contributions. That is why dropping a day a week usually costs less in net pay than the headline salary cut implies. Source: HMRC.