NHS London weighting 2026/27: HCAS rates, zones and what you keep

You have been offered an NHS job in or near London and want to know what the London weighting is really worth, or your payslip shows an “HCAS” line you want to check. For 2026/27 the High Cost Area Supplement is 20% of basic pay in inner London, 15% in outer London and 5% in the fringe, each with a minimum and a maximum. A Band 5 nurse at entry in inner London gets £6,415 a year on top of £32,073, which is about £311 a month more after tax, National Insurance and pension.

HCAS rates for 2026/27

The minimum and maximum went up from 1 April 2026 with the 3.3% pay award. The percentage applies to your basic salary only, not to overtime or unsocial hours payments.

What it adds at each band

Full time, England, 2026/27, tax code 1257L, no student loan. “Take-home a month” is how much more you keep each month compared with the same job outside a high cost area, after Income Tax, National Insurance and the NHS Pension.

Who gets the minimum and who hits the maximum

The minimum lifts the supplement for lower bands, and the maximum caps it for higher ones:

• Inner London: anyone on a basic salary below £28,970 gets the £5,794 minimum, and anyone above £43,730 gets the £8,746 maximum.
• Outer London: anyone on a basic salary below £32,467 gets the £4,870 minimum, and anyone above £40,913 gets the £6,137 maximum.
• Fringe: anyone on a basic salary below £26,920 gets the £1,346 minimum, and anyone above £45,400 gets the £2,270 maximum.

So in inner London, Bands 2 to 4 at entry all get the same £5,794, which is worth 23% of Band 2 pay. From the top of Band 6 upwards everyone gets £8,746, so the supplement shrinks as a share of pay: it is 15.5% at the top of Band 7.

When London weighting moves you into a higher pension tier

HCAS is pensionable, and your NHS Pension rate is set on your whole pensionable pay. If the supplement takes you over a tier line, you pay the higher rate on all of it, so some of the extra pay disappears:

• A Band 4 at entry in the fringe gets £1,420 a year, but it moves them from 6.5% to 8.3%, so take-home rises by only about £43 a month.
• A Band 8b at entry in the fringe gets £2,270, but goes from 10.7% to 12.5%, keeping only about £36 a month of it.
• A Band 5 at entry in inner London moves from 8.3% to 9.8%, but the supplement is big enough that they still keep about £311 a month.

You are not worse off, and the higher contributions buy more pension. But compare offers on take-home, not on the HCAS figure. For the tier lines, see NHS pension contribution rates.

Which zone is your workplace in?

Your zone depends on where you are based for work, not where you live. The zones are set out in Annex 8 of the NHS terms and conditions and still follow the primary care trust boundaries from 2005:

• Inner London: Camden, City and Hackney, Hammersmith and Fulham, Islington, Kensington and Chelsea, Lambeth, Lewisham, Southwark, Tower Hamlets, Wandsworth and Westminster.
• Outer London: Barking and Dagenham, Barnet, Bexley, Brent, Bromley, Croydon, Ealing, Enfield, Greenwich, Haringey, Harrow, Havering, Hillingdon, Hounslow, Kingston, Newham, Redbridge, Richmond and Twickenham, Sutton and Merton, and Waltham Forest.
• Fringe: areas just outside London, including Dartford, Gravesham and Swanley; Basildon, Billericay, Brentwood, Wickford, Epping Forest, Harlow and Thurrock; Dacorum, Hertsmere, Royston, Buntingford, Bishop’s Stortford, South East Hertfordshire, St Albans and Harpenden, Watford and Three Rivers, and Welwyn Hatfield; Bracknell Forest, Slough, Windsor, Ascot and Maidenhead, and Wokingham; and East Elmbridge and Mid Surrey, East Surrey, Guildford and Waverley, North Surrey, and Surrey Heath and Woking.

Two catch people out. Haringey and Newham are outer London for NHS pay, even though teachers there get inner London weighting. And there is no supplement anywhere outside these areas, including Cambridge, Oxford and the other big cities, or in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. If you work across two sites, your contract should say which base sets your HCAS.

Part-time staff

Everything is pro rata: the percentage, the minimum and the maximum. A Band 5 at entry on 22.5 hours in inner London earns £19,244 basic and gets £3,849 HCAS, which is 20% of their part-time pay. The minimum for their hours would be 60% of £5,794, so it does not apply. See NHS part-time pay.

Is it enough to live on in London?

On its own, rarely. A Band 5 at entry in inner London has about £2,351 a month after deductions. Many trusts in and around London add a recruitment and retention premium for hard-to-fill posts, and some help with housing or travel through key worker schemes, so ask what comes on top before you compare a London post with one elsewhere. For a full picture of pay, shifts and deductions, use the NHS pay calculator, or see the NHS pay scales for every band.