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In my review I said to my boss that I thought I was being underpaid.

The London average for what I do is £45k and I am only on £40k, the lowest is £37k.

He said that I need to factor in the bonus I receive every quarter as well as annual profit share.

The average quarterly bonus is £1.1K and annual share is £4k. That all then adds up to about £49k a year.

My question is, am I still being underpaid? Is it fair to factor in bonuses that aren't even guaranteed?

Really don't want to go back and complain if I should be factoring all of that in, but I feel like that is not the right way of working it out?

oOPurple_HazeOo
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    Depends on if the survey that says 45k is average includes bonuses or not. This sort of survey in my industry will usually have a pretty detailed methodology attached so you should be able to sort it out. – Myles Jan 25 '17 at 21:08

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Ditto to Myles's comment: does the "average" you're quoting include bonuses.

But regardless, comparing your salary to some industry average is a very rough measure. How much experience do you have compared to the average person in the survey? What is your skill level? Do you have to work as hard as the average person? What is your work environment like? And realistically, how much is the company making and how much can they afford to pay?

An average is just that: an average. Many people are making more and many are making less. If everyone made at least the average, then it wouldn't be the average any more.

You can throw a number from some survey at the boss as a negotiating tactic, but it really isn't relevant. The only thing that's relevant is, If you decided to quit and get another job, could you find one that pays more, given your particular set of skills and what sort of work you're willing to do?

Jay
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