I never use my company car, any way to do away with the tax?

petrolhead69

I have a company car, I am a field service engineer working from home, my companys nearest depot is 50 miles away but I never need to go there parts are delivered to me or to site. I hate driving my company car and between me and the mrs we have a few nice vehicles so I do 0 private miles in the heap and even if I wanted to use it the boot is always full, the back seats are full, there are ladders on the roof and the passenger seat contains my bin, kettle, laptop etc so it really is useless as a car aside from it being a crap car and doing over 1000 miles a week in it for work the last thing I want to do at the weekend is use it so I would just like to not have to pay tax for it. My work do not offer a car allowance as an alternative or I would buy a van for the added carrying capacity, I hate getting to places like Elgin and having to incomplete a job because I don't carry enough spares.

Has anyone been succesful in doing this with company car tax? I know it's possible with a company van but I get mixed messages depending on who I ask. Fleet department at my company are no use they just tell me no one else has asked fot that and suggest that I should just use the company car for private use.

zzzLazyDaisy

You are right that there is an exemption for vans. This allows an employee to take the van home each day, as HMRC consider the journey to/from work as 'insignificant use' and disregard it. So provided the employee does not use the van for personal journeys, there is no benefit in kind to declare on the P11D.

There is no such exemption for cars, so if a driver takes a car home each day, that is immediately declarable as a company car (hence the use of pool cars in these situations)

But your case is different because you work from home (does your contract actually state that your place of work is your home address?). In that case there is no commuting to/from work, and provided you never use the car for personal use, you can make a declaration to HMRC. I know of a courier company that has a couple of drivers in this situation and they have successfully done this. I suggest that you speak to your local tax office.

petrolhead69

Thanks, I will check my contract to see exactly what it says in regard to my place of work but it does state that travel to/from my first and last jobs of the day are business mileage and I get paid from the minute I leave the house until the minute I am home so I would assume so. I work in a different location every day and only need to travel to the office for the occasional meeting/safety briefing which is usually in the middle of the day.
I will try my specific tax office as the general enquiries line gave me conflicting advice.

Tarasam

The general enquiry line are now the same people as your specific tax office, the telephone line takes you to the next available adviser in the UK.

jimmo

zzzLazyDaisy wrote: »

provided you never use the car for personal use, you can make a declaration to HMRC. I know of a courier company that has a couple of drivers in this situation and they have successfully done this. I suggest that you speak to your local tax office.

Its not quite as simple as that.
http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/manuals/eimanual/EIM23400.htm

zzzLazyDaisy

Yes you are right. I am sorry about that, I had forgotten about the second limb. The company I was referring to does in fact include a specific clause in the contract forbidding private use, for those employees who do not wish to use the cars for personal use (I should have remembered - I drafted it!) But it is a simple amendment to make - it doesn't even have to be in the contract, a letter informing the employee that personal use of the car is forbidden and breach of this requirement may result in disciplinary action should suffice for HMRC purposes.