How to calculate PAYE in Ghana (2026)

PAYE (Pay As You Earn) is the income tax an employer withholds from an employee’s pay every month and pays to the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA). Working it out by hand takes four steps: find the employee’s income, take off their SSNIT contribution, apply the tax bands, and subtract.

This guide uses the monthly table from the Income Tax (Amendment) Act, 2026 (Act 1178), which applies to pay periods from 1 September 2026. Months before that use the previous table, so back pay for an earlier month should be taxed on the table that month used.

Step 1: Work out the employee’s monthly income

Start with basic salary and add the taxable allowances paid in cash, such as a transport or rent allowance. Some payments are taxed differently and are left out of this step:

• Overtime paid to a qualifying junior employee is taxed separately at 5% up to half of monthly basic salary, and 10% on anything above that. This is a final tax. An employee whose qualifying income is more than GH₵18,000 a year doesn’t qualify, and their overtime is taxed as ordinary income instead.
• Bonus up to 15% of annual basic salary is taxed at 5% as a final tax. Anything above that limit is added to ordinary income and taxed on the bands below. The limit is for the whole year, so keep track of what earlier bonuses have already used.
• Benefits in kind, such as a company car or housing, add to taxable income even though no extra cash is paid.

Step 2: Take off the employee’s SSNIT contribution

The employee contributes 5.5% of basic salary to SSNIT (0.5% to Tier 1 and 5% to Tier 2). This comes off before tax. Contributions stop at the maximum insurable earnings, which SSNIT set at GH₵69,000 a month for 2026.

What is left, minus any reliefs the employee has claimed, is the chargeable income.

Step 3: Apply the tax bands

Each slice of chargeable income is taxed at its own rate. Only the part that falls inside a band is taxed at that band’s rate.

Monthly chargeable income (GH₵)	Rate
First 588	0%
Next 80 (588 to 668)	5%
Next 100 (668 to 768)	10%
Next 2,900 (768 to 3,668)	17.5%
Next 16,000 (3,668 to 19,668)	25%
Next 30,332 (19,668 to 50,000)	30%
Above 50,000	35%

Step 4: A worked example

An employee earns a basic salary of GH₵5,000 a month, with no allowances or reliefs.

1. SSNIT: 5.5% × 5,000 = GH₵275.00
2. Chargeable income: 5,000 − 275 = GH₵4,725.00
3. Tax on each band:
   • First 588 at 0% = 0.00
   • Next 80 at 5% = 4.00
   • Next 100 at 10% = 10.00
   • Next 2,900 at 17.5% = 507.50
   • Remaining 1,057 at 25% = 264.25
4. PAYE: GH₵785.75
5. Take-home pay: 5,000 − 275 − 785.75 = GH₵3,939.25

The employer also pays 13% of basic to SSNIT on top of the salary, which is GH₵650.00 in this example. That amount isn’t taken from the employee’s pay.

Reliefs

Employees can claim personal reliefs that reduce their chargeable income. The amounts are per year, so spread them across the months. The main ones are marriage or responsibility relief (GH₵1,200), child education relief (GH₵600 per child), aged dependant relief (GH₵1,000 per dependant), old age relief for those aged 60 and over (GH₵1,500), professional or technical training relief (GH₵2,000) and disability relief (25% of income). Keep the employee’s supporting documents on file.

Paying and filing

PAYE withheld in a month is paid to the GRA together with the DT 0107 monthly return and its employee schedule within 15 days after the end of the month. At the end of the year, the employer files the annual PAYE schedule.

Doing it in Achabs

Achabs’s Payroll module applies all of this automatically: the right table for each pay period, SSNIT up to the ceiling, the overtime and bonus rules with the year-to-date bonus limit tracked, reliefs, benefits in kind, and the DT 0107 and SSNIT returns with their due dates. Every payslip shows each band, so an employee can see how their tax was reached.

Rates and thresholds are as published by the GRA and SSNIT at the time of writing. Check the GRA’s latest notices before relying on them for a filing.