New company car, which is best for tax?

milliemonster

I am due a new company car in a few months and we have an allowance of around £20k to spend, it has to be a minimum of medium sized car (ford focus or above), but I am confused as to how this works with my income tax?, I currently have an Audi A3 which has a benefit in kind of £4k deducted from my personal allowance, how do I work out which car is going to be the least tax deductable from my salary?

JonathanA

It may be worth you buying a copy of What Car? magazine as that lists in its data section the amount of tax you will pay as a basic and higher rate taxpayer for each new car on sale. Bear in mind however that it doesn't take into account the additional amount payable for any options that you have.

The amount you pay will be based on a combination of the list price and the CO2 emissions of the car, so a Focus 1.6 diesel will cost you less per month than an Audi A3 2.0 diesel.

But I'm not an expert! Am sure others will provide more comprehensive advice, but What Car was my starting point!

milliemonster

that's great! thanks, I'll do that!

BillScarab

Try this website

http://www.comcar.co.uk/

you can enter which car you want, what options have been added and any contrubutions you make and it will work out your tax.

Being totally biased I'd say look at Skoda Octavias (my company car is one), lowish list price and good emissions mean the tax is fairly low. It's also basically the same car as an A3 underneath.

Bean_Counter

Ideally you want something with CO2 emissions of 120 g/km or less. I believe that there is now an A3 in this category.

stratty

Basically you want the cheapest car you can find with the lowest CO2 emissions.

ukjoel

If you like the A3 may be worth checking out the VW or Skoda options as underneath they are pretty much the same cars.

VW does a golf bluemotion which is a low CO2 car Sub 120 I think.
Skoda have the Octavia and Fabia - I think the Fabia starts at 109 CO2 and the Octavia at 119.

Would also suggest you drive any car first. A lot of the low CO2 cars have had soundprrofing removed to reduce weight and are very noisy.