Here in the UK, when you start a new job, they are going to want to see your P45 so they can deduct tax correctly. There is zero point in trying to conceal your salary. And if you have, ahem, exaggerated it, that will be spotted too (and counts as lying in your application).
I'm just a cynical colonist, but I can't help thinking that an employer asking for that form prior to giving you a job offer is just borrowing the implied authority of government to convince you to compromise your own negotiating position. There absolutely is a point to concealing your previous salary until after they give you a job offer with defined terms. If they learn your salary history subsequent to that, it won't cause them to suddenly renegotiate your compensation package.
So yes, find a different excuse, but find an excuse.
That isn't true, although it's how most people go about it.
While a new employer will request pages from your P45, it is not mandatory to hand them over. You can send them to the tax office who will notify the new employer of your tax code. The instructions to do this are on the back, I believe (I recently got bored while processing a new employee and read it all! It was news to me too :-)).
Also, this is only mandatory _after_ you've secured a position. I've always concealed past salaries and never had to present my P45 until I've actually started work.
I can only second patio11's point here. My salary expectations have doubled over the past few years by just shopping around and keeping my mouth shut about previous salaries.
But you might not have. You don't need to come up with excuses. Just say what patio11 said. Just say that it's for professional reasons. No point digging a hole for yourself.
It's not an excuse, it's an Appeal To A Higher Authority.
Similarly a hiring manager will tell you that she has to have your salary history and can't possibly go above an arbitrary number because HR and the VP of IT just won't stand for it. Each gambit is equally misdirecting.
It's only an excuse (in the sense meant here) if you actually would disclose other employers' pay policies outside of a salary negotiation. As long as you don't do that, I'd be inclined to call it the truth.
I'm in the UK too. When I was hired for my last full time job (about ten years ago, so memories are a little fuzzy) when I was asked what my current salary was, I just replied "I want x", rather than saying what I was earning. They could find that out from my P45, but that was after everything was signed and I'd started at the new place.
At my previous job, I was underpaid compared to the average rate for developers in my area, so I needed to short cut a decent payrise. I wasn't asking for an outrageous amount, but so the company who were hiring me didn't find what I was asking for too high to pay.
I don't know whether they actually ever checked my P45 for my old rate, I doubt it. That side is handled by the accounts/payroll department, rather than upper management. If the upper management were that concerned about the rate at which they hired me, they'd have negotiated down at the time, not once they'd hired me.
Exactly, they don't really want to know what your earning. Do what politicians to and answer the question you want to be asked not the question they're actually asking.
There is another way to work around that. Most large UK companies pay you in lieu of unused holiday allowance when you leave. If you arrange to leave your previous company in late April/early May and have this holiday pay included in your final paycheck, only this paycheck will appear on your P45. So if your new employer estimates your previous salary by looking at your P45 to see what you earned in that month and multiplying it by 12, you can easily have them overestimate by about 25%.
Although I'd imagine that would be after your hire that they have to worry about taxes- not during negotiation.
Kinda like declining to talk about if you have kids during an interview. Sure the company likely will find out after you're hired if you have them, but you don't need to answer questions about it upfront.
Here in the UK, when you start a new job, they are going to want to see your P45 so they can deduct tax correctly. There is zero point in trying to conceal your salary. And if you have, ahem, exaggerated it, that will be spotted too (and counts as lying in your application).