Value of expenses when staying away on business?

24

Comments

  • paddyrg
    paddyrg Posts: 13,543 Forumite
    zygurat789 wrote: »
    Is eating ever wholly for business purposes?

    Lol - but if for instance you've no choice but to eat in a restaurant as you can't be expected to cook for yourself in a hotel room...

    Mind you I'm sure there are people on this site who'll boil kippers in a hotel kettle!
  • zygurat789
    zygurat789 Posts: 4,263 Forumite
    First Anniversary Combo Breaker
    paddyrg wrote: »
    Lol - but if for instance you've no choice but to eat in a restaurant as you can't be expected to cook for yourself in a hotel room...

    Mind you I'm sure there are people on this site who'll boil kippers in a hotel kettle!

    Isn't it in the area where part of the cost is private, because you have to eat to live, and part is allowable because of the additional cost of eating out as opposed to at home?
    The only thing that is constant is change.
  • zygurat789
    zygurat789 Posts: 4,263 Forumite
    First Anniversary Combo Breaker
    paddyrg wrote: »
    Lol - but if for instance you've no choice but to eat in a restaurant as you can't be expected to cook for yourself in a hotel room...

    Mind you I'm sure there are people on this site who'll boil kippers in a hotel kettle!

    So you only eat at lunchtime when you are entertaining which is, of course, not an allowable expense for tax purposes?
    The only thing that is constant is change.
  • Pennywise
    Pennywise Posts: 13,468 Forumite
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    Don't forget that there is a world of difference in tax allowability depending on whether you are a sole trader (where HMRC business income manual applies) or whether you are a director of your own limited company (where HMRC employment income manual applies).

    For a director/employee, the expense has to be wholly and exclusively for business purposes like a sole trader, AND necessarily which applies to directors/employees!

    Can it ever be "necessary" to eat at a Michelin restaurant when there's a Pizza Hut nearby - the director may have to justify his reasoning if challenged by HMRC that a particular expense wasn't necessary, i.e. that there was no alternative restaurant at that time? I would also strongly suspect that a tax inspector would want to charge a Michelin meal as a taxable benefit in kind even if it is allowable as a company tax deductible expense as there is clearly a personal benefit over and above the bare subsistence level.
  • sinizterguy
    sinizterguy Posts: 1,178 Forumite
    Pennywise wrote: »
    Can it ever be "necessary" to eat at a Michelin restaurant when there's a Pizza Hut nearby - the director may have to justify his reasoning if challenged by HMRC that a particular expense wasn't necessary, i.e. that there was no alternative restaurant at that time? I would also strongly suspect that a tax inspector would want to charge a Michelin meal as a taxable benefit in kind even if it is allowable as a company tax deductible expense as there is clearly a personal benefit over and above the bare subsistence level.

    Is it necessary to eat at Pizza Hut when you can buy a prepacked sandwich from a corner shop ? No. And so on.

    You don't have to do a detailed price comparison of your post code before buying meal.

    You're misinterpreting to suit your point.

    You are wrong. Totally.

    I'll leave it at that.
  • HappyMJ
    HappyMJ Posts: 21,115 Forumite
    Combo Breaker First Post
    I don't think I've ever eaten at a Pizza Hut when working away on business. Isn't that a family restaurant? It's not really suitable for a meal when working away. I need a restaurant in which I can relax, wind down and not have screaming kids running around me getting ice cream from the self serve. I usually eat a 2-3 course meal at moderately priced restaurants with a bottle of wine or a few beers.
    :footie:
    :p Regular savers earn 6% interest (HSBC, First Direct, M&S) :p Loans cost 2.9% per year (Nationwide) = FREE money. :p
  • Pennywise
    Pennywise Posts: 13,468 Forumite
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    edited 20 October 2014 at 8:50AM
    sinizterguy wrote: »
    You are wrong. Totally. I'll leave it at that.

    Please provide evidence/links that HMRC allow extravangent meals as subsistence?

    I've been dealing with HMRC for over 30 years and this topic regularly comes up in PAYE inspections. Yes, it's allowable for the company corporation tax return, but it can trigger a taxable benefit in kind for the director/employee who had the meal if HMRC argue that it wasn't "necessarily" and that it's purpose was the pleasure of the person rather than subsistence.

    A very quick google search find the following link which gives an idea of their thinking on this subject:-

    https://www.gov.uk/expenses-benefits-meals-employees-directors/what-to-report-and-pay

    "Free or subsidised meals that aren’t exempt
    This includes meals that: ...aren’t on a reasonable scale, eg elaborate meals with fine wines"


    and

    http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/manuals/eimanual/EIM31835.htm

    "Where the travel arrangements are unusually lavish you should consider whether, on the facts of the case, the expenditure is genuinely attributable to business travel or is, for example, some sort of reward."

    In reality, HMRC will usually accept a normal restaurant, but you have to expect challenge, like I say, if you dine at a gourmet restaurant for no obvious business reason. Posters who say otherwise are totally wrong! It's a matter of common sense and not taking the Mickey!
  • Aquamania
    Aquamania Posts: 2,112 Forumite
    edited 20 October 2014 at 10:37AM
    IDN101 wrote: »
    Hi all,

    I am going away on business for a few nights next week. This is for my own limited company. Can anyone please advise on the value of expenses I can legitimately claim for evening meals, etc? Or better still point me towards a HMRC data sheet- I've searched the HMRC website but can't find any specific info.

    Many thanks

    Regards,
    Ian

    As an employee of your own limited company, you can presumably charge the limited company what you want (unless you have rules in place to prevent this). Ultimately it is your money you are spending. :cool:

    Unless your company has a dispensation in place (which you have not mentioned) then the company needs to disclose such payments to HMRC and issue you with a P11d
    This means you will be taxed on these payments at the marginal rate.

    You can however request tax relief on such payments if they were incurred "wholly and exclusively for the purposes of the business". You can do this via your tax return.

    As with everything else, the taxman will be looking for 'reasonableness'. i.e. what is typical. If you start trying to avoid tax by claiming for things that are untypical in either nature or value, expect the tax man to start investigating. Believe me, you wouldn't wish your worst enemy to have the tax man investigate them.
  • Aquamania
    Aquamania Posts: 2,112 Forumite
    sinizterguy wrote: »
    Spending a hundred pounds on a gourmet meal, staying in a five star hotel and flying or taking the train in first class are all fine.

    HMRC cannot tell you where to spend your money and how. As long as it is wholly for the purpose of business.

    If you work for someone other than yourself, then they set the policy and you follow it.

    Please don't present drivel as fact.

    I have done all of the above. I have had my tax return looked at by HMRC for an unrelated matter and they couldn't have cared less where I ate, or which hotel I stayed in. Or how I got there.

    As a Serious MoneySaving Fan, I would urge you to review your extravagant spending.

    You don't have to stay in the Ibis and eat a Big Mac Meal if you don't want to (but I have done so in the past), but throwing your money around like some kind of multi-millionaire is not really moneysaving.

    Ask MSE Martin. He's got a few million I understand (about 80 in fact before he gave some of it away) but I don't think he spends £100s on a gourmet meal or stays in 5 star hotels when he is out & about on business (though I do hear he prefers to take a taxi rather than the bus)
  • InsideInsurance
    InsideInsurance Posts: 22,460 Forumite
    First Post Combo Breaker
    Aquamania wrote: »
    Ask MSE Martin. He's got a few million I understand (about 80 in fact before he gave some of it away) but I don't think he spends £100s on a gourmet meal or stays in 5 star hotels when he is out & about on business

    That seems rather intimate knowledge of him?

    Could that be for PR reasons more than anything else? Hard to give the image of a consumer champion and standing up for the little guy from the Presidential Suite of the Mandarin Oriental

    Can't say I've ever met Martin but did some work with one of his cohorts/ MD of a business he used to promote and appeared on TV with a few times together bank bashing. Certainly he wasnt staying in the Ibis and eating in Pizza Hut but then Im not going to claim to know if he paid for it personally or via his company - I was just happy with the free meals and drinks etc and he was an entertaining guy to be around.
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