What do substitute teachers in Northern Ireland get paid in 2024? Teachers’ pay scale and deductions are not a secret but for those contemplating a career change, or for students trying to decide on a future, knowing the salary can be a big factor in deciding what career you are considering. Let’s deep dive into what no one wants to talk about … what do teachers get paid?
I hope this article helps you to see what happens to your annual salary.
If you are wondering if teaching is the next stage for you, check out this article – PGCE English: is teaching the right job for you?
If you are looking for permanent teachers’ pay scales, check out this article:
Teachers' pay in Northern Ireland
Public sector pay has suffered over the last decade or more. Inflationary pay awards are now a fight, not an annual certainty. Since 2010, inflationary pay rises have stopped. For the last number of years, teachers in most of the teaching unions have been asked to take part in Action Short of Strike Action, which escalated into strike action over a series of half-day and full-day strikes in 2023/24.
Finally, in April 2024, the DE agreed to a pay deal for teachers as part of the funding secured when Stormont returned. This new pay arrangement includes changes to salary scales for the current academic year which will be back-dated to September 2023, as well as back-dated increases for the years 2022/23 and 2021/22.
In the tables below, I have kept the old 2023/24 pay scales for reference but added columns to show the new pay scales which will be used going forward.
The image below shows the new pay arrangements for teachers doing the same job across the four UK nations. As you can see, there is a better sense of parity now than previously, but there is still some variation.
Substitute teachers in Northern Ireland
What is NISTR?
NISTR is the Northern Ireland Supply Teacher Register which is how substitute teachers in Northern Ireland are paid. Sub-teachers must be fully qualified with a university degree in a relevant subject and a teaching qualification, such as a PGCE (or BEd). Also, they need to have completed all pre-employment checks. This includes a Right to Work check, an Access NI certificate (this costs £33 at present) and references. All of these documents need to be uploaded onto the sub-teacher’s NISTR profile. For more information, check out the guidance on the EANI website or the NISTR website.
Once you register and set your school and subject preferences, schools can search for supply teachers and locate you. But what are you paid as a supply teacher? The tables below explain this more fully.
Substitute teacher pay scale Northern Ireland
Substitute (or supply) teachers in Northern Ireland are paid using the same pay scales as permanent teachers.
There were six salary points on the Main Pay Scale (MPS): M1 – M6. As of 2023/24, M1 has been removed, and M2 now begins at £30,000, meaning there are now five salary points of the MPS.
At the end of your M6 year, you can, and should, apply to progress onto the Upper Pay Scale (UPS). The Upper Pay Scale has three points, and you remain at each point for two years until UPS3, which is the highest basic salary point for a classroom teacher in Northern Ireland (i.e. for a classroom teaching job without additional paid responsibilities).
Update April 2024: The NI Executive have (finally) agreed and ratified a new pay deal for teachers which includes back pay for three years at different rates. You can read more about the specifics here, but the tables below have been updated to reflect the new pay scales for 2023/24.
Teachers' Main Pay Scale (MPS)
| Main Pay Scale | Annual Salary (OLD) | Annual Salary (NEW) |
| M1 | £24,137 | |
| M2 | £26,045 | £30,000 |
| M3 | £28,139 | £32,065 |
| M4 | £30,305 | £34,671 |
| M5 | £32,693 | £37,092 |
| M6 | £35,277 | £39,945 |
Teachers' Upper Pay Scale (UPS)
| Upper Pay Scale | Annual Salary (OLD) | Annual Salary (NEW) |
| UPS1 | £38,216 | £43,190 |
| UPS2 | £39,630 | £44,751 |
| UPS3 | £41,094 | £46,367 |
The main difference for a substitute teacher’s pay is that you are paid per day rather than per month. If you are a beginning teacher, you will be paid per day on M1 (or M2 which is the new beginning teacher salary from April 2024). If you are in your fifth year of teaching, you will be paid per day on M5 (M6 as of April 2024). This means that those who do not have a permanent contract are not losing out financially in their salary (…with some caveats! See the ‘advantages and disadvantages’ section below).
Teachers who are employed on a temporary basis are paid at a daily rate via NISTR (the Northern Ireland Substitute Teacher’s Register). NISTR has a ‘new solution’ software in operation since August 2022 and there have been many glitches! One purpose of the new system is to ensure substitute teachers are pre-booked, meaning that schools don’t waste time phoning teachers on NISTR who are already employed for that day, week or year. Jobs are offered in advance and confirmed by the teacher on the NISTR website. Schools will then authorise the payment after the teacher has attended for each day booked.
What is the daily rate for substitute teachers in Northern Ireland?
The daily rate is calculated based on the fact that there are 195 working days in a school year, and if you were to work every single day, you would be paid the same total as a permanent member of staff at the same salary position as you. Unfortunately for substitute teachers, they are often not able to work 195 days due to the fact that up to ten of these working days are non-contact i.e. there are no pupils in school for staff training (INSET days, Baker days, SID days … different schools used different labels for these days). It is often the case that there are quieter times of year, where schools don’t need a sub teacher.
Daily rate for Northern Ireland substitute teachers= annual salary ÷ 195 x no. of days worked
The tables below show you the daily rate worked out for each of the salary points on MPS and UPS.
Do supply teachers get holiday pay?
Yes supply teachers in Northern Ireland get holiday pay. Instead of receiving your holiday pay after a holiday, it is broken down and paid per day that you work, included in your daily rate.
Let’s look at this more closely.
A permanent teacher on UPS3 in Northern Ireland gets an annual salary of £41,094. This is paid equally per day throughout the year, meaning their annual salary is paid in 12 equal instalments of £3863.92 (before deductions), and this gives a daily rate of approximately £127.03, every day all year.
A substitute teacher on UPS3 in Northern Ireland also gets an annual salary of £46,367. This is paid in instalments based on how many days that month that you worked with holiday pay included. So a substitute teacher on UPS3 gets £46,367 divided by 195 (the number of possible working days in the year). This makes their daily rate £237.78, which is significantly more than a permanent teacher’s daily rate. If you work all year, the final total is identical, and if you only work some days in the year, then you are still being paid your holiday pay, but you have to budget to save some of the daily rate for the holiday months. I hope this makes sense!
Substitute Teachers' Daily Rate on MPS (2023-24)
| Main Pay Scale | Annual Salary (OLD) | Daily Rate (OLD) | Annual Salary (NEW) | Daily Rate (NEW) |
| M1 | £24,137 | £123.78 | ||
| M2 | £26,045 | £133.56 | £30,000 | £153.85 |
| M3 | £28,139 | £144.30 | £32,065 | £164.44 |
| M4 | £30,305 | £155.41 | £34,671 | £177.80 |
| M5 | £32,693 | £167.66 | £37,092 | £190.22 |
| M6 | £35,277 | £180.91 | £39,945 | £204.85 |
Substitute Teachers' Daily Rate on UPS (2023-24)
| Upper Pay Scale | Annual Salary (OLD) | Daily Rate (OLD) | Annual Salary (NEW) | Daily Rate (NEW) |
| UPS1 | £38,216 | £195.98 | £43,190 | £221.49 |
| UPS2 | £39,630 | £203.23 | £44,751 | £229.49 |
| UPS3 | £41,094 | £210.74 | £46,367 | £237.78 |
Types of temporary contracts in Northern Ireland?
The length and type of these substitute jobs vary immensely. A substitute teacher may be offered:
- a single day of teaching
- a series of isolated days across several weeks
- a specific block of several weeks or months
- a maternity leave which is less than one complete academic year an indefinite offer (for example, a long-term sickness cover)
- and there are other variations too, due to the unpredictable nature of unplanned absences.
Long-term contract lasting one academic year or more
Teachers who have a long-term contract (one full academic year or more) should be paid monthly via EA (the Education Authority). In these long term contracts, each month is an equal division (one twelfth) of the annual salary, and shares more in common with permanent teachers’ pay: check out this article What do permanent teachers get paid 2024?
There are pros and cons to these temporary contracts in terms of pay and conditions.
Advantages of the daily rate for sub teachers in NI
- You get paid more per day than a teacher on a permanent contract as your holiday pay is divided down and included in your daily rate.
- You still contribute to a teacher’s pension, accumulating one pensionable day for each full day worked.
- Your tax is calculated on a PAYE basis, same as a permanent teacher.
- If you have been offered work which is then cancelled beyond your control, you should still get paid. This happened for example in October 2020 during the ‘circuit breaker’ week off, in which the Department for Education and EA decided that schools should close for a week in addition to the Hallowe’en holiday that year in order to flatten the curve of Covid-19 infections. Another example of this was in June 2022, September 2022 and May 2023 when additional bank holiday days were awarded by Westminster (one to celebrate the Queen’s Jubilee, another for a day of national mourning for the Queen’s funeral, and a third for the King’s Coronation). These days were paid to teachers who would normally have been working due to the job offer from their school.
Disadvantages of the daily rate for sub teachers in NI
- Being paid per day means you don’t get paid for the days the school is closed or days which you are not needed/employed. Some months you can work as many as 23 days while in others (e.g. February), you may only be able to work a maximum of 15 days.
- Sub teachers get paid in the middle of the following month (the 12th working day). Once you are working consecutive months, this is not really a con as the gap between pay days is the same, but it’s hard going initially to work a full month and have to wait another 2-3 weeks before you see the money in your account.
- Pay day is not fixed: it is the 12th working day of the month. This is difficult if you are trying to time payments, direct debits etc. Where weekends and bank holidays fall makes a different of three of four days to pay day.
- You need to budget, saving some money in your big months to tide you over during leaner months. If you work every teaching day in the school year, you have big pay in October through to July, but nothing in August. September pay will be small given most schools only go back at the end of August, so you will have very few, if any, days worked in August.
- If you are unable to work due to sickness, your school will cancel the offer for that day on NISTR, and you will not get paid. This is at the discretion of your school and some are very good at supporting their regular substitute teachers. (Sick pay for long term temporary teachers should be outlined in your contract of employment, or you can consult EA for clarification).
- Each month is slightly different, which makes budgeting difficult. February is a short month and usually has several holidays due to half term. December has Christmas holidays removed, Easter might fall in March or in April, or straddle both months. All this seems obvious, but when you get paid in the middle of January for days worked in December, it can come as a bit of a shock to have lost 7 to 10 of your payable days. In comparison, your pay for February is usually much bigger as January is a long, full month for schools, giving more earning potential for substitute teachers.
When do substitute teachers get paid in Northern Ireland?
Payday for temporary teachers in Northern Ireland who are paid via NISTR (Northern Ireland Supply Teacher Register) is the 12th working day of the following month.
That means payday for substitute teachers falls on the following days in 2024:
| Month Worked | Payday |
| December 2023 | Wednesday 17th January 2024 |
| January 2024 | Friday 16th February 2024 |
| February 2024 | Tuesday 19th March 2024 |
| March 2024 | Wednesday 17th April 2024 |
| April 2024 | Friday 17th May 2024 |
| May 2024 | Tuesday 18th June 2024 |
| June 2024 | Wednesday 17th July 2024 |
| July 2024 | Friday 16th August 2024 (note: schools in NI are closed in July, so technically there is no payday in August, but many sub teachers will be due some tax refunds which come through employer payslips on the same day as payday. |
| August 2024 | Tuesday 17th September 2024 |
| September 2024 | Wednesday 16th October 2024 |
| October 2024 | Monday 18th November 2024 |
| November 2024 | Tuesday 17th December 2024 |
| December 2024 | Friday 17th January 2025 |
If you are interested in free interactive teaching tools, you might like to check out these resources:
