Not be allowed to Charge your Company Car at Home

[Meltham Terrier]

I'm looking for a solution for an issue I have.

I have a New ID7 Tourer Due in October and already have a charger installed , so all is good, However, our company states that they will not reimburse electric costs if the car is charged at home. The car has to be charged either at the office 170 miles away or on a commercial charger.

The car will have private mileage so fully funded. The policy makes no sense as I could have stop around the corner from home to charge so that I can travel the following day.

Anyone had similar issues and if so what did you do. I'm going to have another conversation about this next week, The person making the decision is not UK Based.

Thanks

[Sheepshanks]

Set up Meltham Terrier Charging Inc and claim their invoices.

[borcy]

I assume they pay for commercial chargers so I'd just use them. Yes perhaps a faff but it's free.

[AndyJWB]

A 20-80% charge on a cheap overnight tariff will be, what, about £4?

For the cost of a coffee, I'd be inclined just to suck it up and charge at home when using a public charger is a faff. Definitely worth a conversation with your employer, though.

[RammyMP]

Or charge it at home and don’t claim for the cost to charge it? I’d do that instead of pissing about with public chargers.

Our EV costs about £5 to fully charge and a charge will last a week.

[IanJ9375]

What's more costly to you? The cheap overnight charging or the inconvenience of having to pop the car somewhere for 30mins or so - I'd suck it up but our company car doesn't pay for private miles so we just get paid per business mile which more than covers those trips when the cheap tariff is used

[Meltham Terrier]

borcy said:

I assume they pay for commercial chargers so I'd just use them. Yes perhaps a faff but it's free.

yes they will pay for commercial charging no issues.

[borcy]

Meltham Terrier said:

borcy said:

I assume they pay for commercial chargers so I'd just use them. Yes perhaps a faff but it's free.

yes they will pay for commercial charging no issues.

How convenient is that?

How likely is it that your employer will change their mind?

[Muzzer79]

RammyMP said:

Or charge it at home and don t claim for the cost to charge it? I d do that instead of pissing about with public chargers.

Our EV costs about £5 to fully charge and a charge will last a week.

Not so much of an issue if it lasts a week.

If the OP is doing 300 miles in a working day and he's charging every day.....more of a problem.

OP - I'd speak to HR and try to make them see sense.

[EmailAddress]

Setup a Limited Company and bill yourself each month?

[BlackTails]

EmailAddress said:

Setup a Limited Company and bill yourself each month?

Doubtful the set up and maintenance costs of a company would make saving £4 here and there viable.

[EmailAddress]

BlackTails said:

EmailAddress said:

Setup a Limited Company and bill yourself each month?

Doubtful the set up and maintenance costs of a company would make saving £4 here and there viable.

I can't imagine public chargers cost the company £4.

£50 setup, and a Tax Return once a year. He can bill £25 a tank each week

[JQ]

Muzzer79 said:

RammyMP said:

Or charge it at home and don t claim for the cost to charge it? I d do that instead of pissing about with public chargers.

Our EV costs about £5 to fully charge and a charge will last a week.

Not so much of an issue if it lasts a week.

If the OP is doing 300 miles in a working day and he's charging every day.....more of a problem.

OP - I'd speak to HR and try to make them see sense.

Perhaps provide them with a cost comparison -

For my car, 15,000 miles charging at home costs circa £300, the same miles on a public charger at 80p per Kw would cost circa £3,400. Would seem to be a very expensive policy.

[Meltham Terrier]

Muzzer79 said:

Not so much of an issue if it lasts a week.

If the OP is doing 300 miles in a working day and he's charging every day.....more of a problem.

OP - I'd speak to HR and try to make them see sense.

It's HR which are the problem on this, so the ltd company and bill might be the solution.

for me its a convenance thing.

[BlackTails]

EmailAddress said:

BlackTails said:

EmailAddress said:

Setup a Limited Company and bill yourself each month?

Doubtful the set up and maintenance costs of a company would make saving £4 here and there viable.

I can't imagine public chargers cost the company £4.

£50 setup, and a Tax Return once a year. He can bill £25 a tank each week

Uh-huh.

And only slightly fraudulent as far as his employer goes.

So a bit like a sledgehammer to crack a nut preceded by a canter through a live minefield to collect the sledgehammer.

Great idea!

[Truckosaurus]

I claim a certain number of pence for my work mileage (same rate for electric/petrol/diesel/etc cars) and have to attach a VAT receipt for some 'fuel' bought a month either side of the date of the journey.

You can use the same receipt for multiple journeys.

So in theory I need only use a public charger every other month to claim all my mileage.

[Muzzer79]

Meltham Terrier said:

Muzzer79 said:

Not so much of an issue if it lasts a week.

If the OP is doing 300 miles in a working day and he's charging every day.....more of a problem.

OP - I'd speak to HR and try to make them see sense.

It's HR which are the problem on this, so the ltd company and bill might be the solution.

for me its a convenance thing.

How many miles are you actually doing?

Problem for HR is that your home electricity bill mixes your home usage (lights, etc) with charging your car and you can't seperate the two.

Does your car have a record of charging on an app or similar so you can isolate it?

If they're just obstinate and stonewall you, frankly, I'd just suck up the £4 a day and leave it - unless I was doing mega miles.

[shalmaneser]

Just pay for home charging yourself and charge elsewhere for free if/when it's convenient? It's a bit silly but doesn't seem like a hill worth dying on unless you happen to be making daily trips of 300 miles exactly.

[mikey_b]

BlackTails said:

EmailAddress said:

BlackTails said:

EmailAddress said:

Setup a Limited Company and bill yourself each month?

Doubtful the set up and maintenance costs of a company would make saving £4 here and there viable.

I can't imagine public chargers cost the company £4.

£50 setup, and a Tax Return once a year. He can bill £25 a tank each week

Uh-huh.

And only slightly fraudulent as far as his employer goes.

So a bit like a sledgehammer to crack a nut preceded by a canter through a live minefield to collect the sledgehammer.

Great idea!

What makes it fraud? Surely it would only be fraud if he didn't set up an actual company. If he does, and it's not difficult to register one, then it's a legit company issuing invoices for charging that he then submits as expenses.

However, registering a company costs £100 via Companies House. That's actually quite a bit of charging at ~7p/kWh. So it's a good job his newly created company sells electricity for £1/kWh. It's a high cost because of the convenience, you see - it's done right at home, instead of having to go to a special place for half an hour, and that means he can get cracking with the journey every morning instead of having to stop en-route.

[shtu]

To me, that feels like vehicle charging has just become a work activity.

Take it to a commercial charger in office hours. If that means you have to pop out for an hour to go hook it up and walk back, them's the breaks, it's their (stupid) rule that's forcing you to do that.

I'd imagine a week or two of that would have the policy changed fairly quickly.