Mileage expenses

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Does anybody know what is mileage is claimable under HMRC rules in the following circumstances?

1. Employee travels 10 miles to office and then a further 7 miles to site visit.

2. Employee travels 15 miles to site (not main office) and then back home

3. Employee travels 4 miles to site and then back home.

My guesses are

1. 7 miles (employee cant claim for normal commute)
2. 15 miles (employee does not need to deduct normal commute)
3. 4 miles (employee does not need to deduct normal commute)

Our Policy has been one where you only claim the excess of mileage over and above your normal commute. However I believe HMRC rules don't insist on this. However i cant find anything definitive on their website

[Mr Pointy]

I'd say mileage for the day less 20 miles because you'd have done that if you went into the office but I can't find anything on the HMRC website that supports that. Do either of these help?

https://www.driversnote.co.uk/hmrc-mileage-guide/m...
https://www.gov.uk/hmrc-internal-manuals/employmen...

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Mr Pointy said:

I'd say mileage for the day less 20 miles because you'd have done that if you went into the office but I can't find anything on the HMRC website that supports that. Do either of these help?

https://www.driversnote.co.uk/hmrc-mileage-guide/m...
https://www.gov.uk/hmrc-internal-manuals/employmen...

That's what we effectively have at the moment but I've got a nagging thought that isn't what HMRC allow. Thanks for the links - I'll have a peruse.

[Sheepshanks]

As long as the stop in 1) is incidental to the journey (ie pick up documents etc) the employee can claim tax relief on the whole lot in all 3 cases.

[PF62]

What an employer might pay for business mileage and what HMRC accept as business mileage are two completely different things.

My last employer (before I retired) operated a 'lessor of' rule, which was you could claim whatever was the shortest journey - office to site or home to site. So if it was 10 miles to the site from home but 6 miles from the office, then you could claim 6 miles. If it was 15 miles from the office but 8 miles from home then you could claim 8 miles.

There wasn't a deduction for mileage for the normal commute, but I am aware that some employers operate such a system. However there was a deduction of time for hourly paid employees - i.e. if someone drove directly to a site from home and that took 45 minutes but their normal commute was 30 minutes, then only 15 minutes of the trip was work time.

HMRC's rules are completely different and are simply - what mileage did you actually do, provided you are not trying to cheat and are pretending that a journey is a site visit rather than your normal commute. As already mentioned, if you do have to pop into the office just to pick up papers or equipment and don't do any substantial work whilst you are in the office, then the whole 'home to office to site' visit counts as business mileage.

What you can do is claim tax relief on the difference between what an employer pays and what HMRC allows.

[Terminator X]

PF62 said:

What an employer might pay for business mileage and what HMRC accept as business mileage are two completely different things.

My last employer (before I retired) operated a 'lessor of' rule, which was you could claim whatever was the shortest journey - office to site or home to site. So if it was 10 miles to the site from home but 6 miles from the office, then you could claim 6 miles. If it was 15 miles from the office but 8 miles from home then you could claim 8 miles.

There wasn't a deduction for mileage for the normal commute, but I am aware that some employers operate such a system. However there was a deduction of time for hourly paid employees - i.e. if someone drove directly to a site from home and that took 45 minutes but their normal commute was 30 minutes, then only 15 minutes of the trip was work time.

HMRC's rules are completely different and are simply - what mileage did you actually do, provided you are not trying to cheat and are pretending that a journey is a site visit rather than your normal commute. As already mentioned, if you do have to pop into the office just to pick up papers or equipment and don't do any substantial work whilst you are in the office, then the whole 'home to office to site' visit counts as business mileage.

What you can do is claim tax relief on the difference between what an employer pays and what HMRC allows.

What would you do if it was a 20 mile journey to the office each day and one one day a week you have a 20 mile journey to site instead, do not go to the office?

Imho employers are "cheap" if they seek to deduct office miles etc when people are going to site. If you send them to site then pay for the full site mileage ffs.

TX.

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PF62 said:

HMRC's rules are completely different and are simply - what mileage did you actually do, provided you are not trying to cheat and are pretending that a journey is a site visit rather than your normal commute. As already mentioned, if you do have to pop into the office just to pick up papers or equipment and don't do any substantial work whilst you are in the office, then the whole 'home to office to site' visit counts as business mileage.

Thanks, that's what I thought the current rules were.

Our current policy deducts "home to base" from any mileage but i think we'll be uplifting it to this.

[surveyor]

Always really annoys me when firms do this.

Yes I might be saving a few pennies on my commuting mileage, because I'm going straight to site, but typically this means I'm leaving home earlier etc.

Glad its not bullst I have to put up with!

[Sheepshanks]

PF62 said:

HMRC's rules are completely different and are simply - what mileage did you actually do, provided you are not trying to cheat and are pretending that a journey is a site visit rather than your normal commute. As already mentioned, if you do have to pop into the office just to pick up papers or equipment and don't do any substantial work whilst you are in the office, then the whole 'home to office to site' visit counts as business mileage.

What you can do is claim tax relief on the difference between what an employer pays and what HMRC allows.

What's quite odd is that HMRC's rules as an employer are the usual 'deduct commute mileage'. I guess all public sector is the same.

[MustangGT]

IIRC HMRC has a different set of rules dependent on whether you are office based or home based. It is worth looking into this and also employment contract terms. Employees also need to consider that any difference in mileage paid from HMRC basis has an effect on personal tax. If you pay more than HMRC basis it is taxable. if less then it is a business expense claimable against tax.

[stumpage]

surveyor said:

Always really annoys me when firms do this.

Yes I might be saving a few pennies on my commuting mileage, because I'm going straight to site, but typically this means I'm leaving home earlier etc.

Glad its not bullst I have to put up with!

It may be bullst and I use to agree until HMRC came and did a full check on our business. They went back over 5 years of mileage expenses for all of us company car drivers. They would put the journey you were claiming for into AA Maps (which was the go to at the time) and question you if the mileage didn't match. Getting grilled about why 4 years ago you took an additional 10 miles to a job was difficult, it could have been a diversion, quicker another route but they expected us to know and have it logged.

For 2 weeks they did this, it was relentless and some of our sales team were up all night having to find answers and go through old diaries etc. They were even questioning expenses that ex employees had claimed. It was brutal.

Now we stick to the letter, which is easier now most car apps can download you a monthly spread sheet.

Edited by stumpage on Monday 10th May 20:15