Am i allowed to claim mileage from temporary place of work to Home?

barnishroader

HI,

I get paid a car allowance at my place of work.

I then can claim mileage allowance on business miles other than to and from my normal place of work.

I was always of the understanding, and as the case with my previous employer, that should i have to visit a temporary place of work ( i work in construction so that would normally be various building sites for meetings) i can claim for the mileage from home to that place and back home again.

Or if my journey took me from Home to Temporary Place to the Office i could claim all of that journey if the temporary place was not on my normal journey to work.

My new employer has challenged this and said that they think that it is only valid to claim from Home to the temporary place but not the return journey.

Who is correct here?

I take it whatever the correct view on this would also be the same as taken by Inland Revenue should i claim for expenses with them?

TheCyclingProgrammer

Home to temporary workplace and temporary workplace to office would be considered business mileage. Home to normal place of work or vice versa is ordinary commuting.

So in your example you'd be able to claim for both legs of the outward journey but not the return journey if commuting directly back home from the normal workplace.

barnishroader

But what about from temporary workplace to home?

TheCyclingProgrammer

That would also be business travel.

barnishroader

Really. I would have thought that as you are being asked to go out of your way to the temporary place, then as the cost of fuel etc would be a detriment then you should be recompensed for that.

For example if I was asked say to drive from an office in London to a site in Leeds that I only need to visit at most once per month then by that reasoning I could only claim for 1 journey and be greatly out of pocket.

That doesn't seem right to me.

TheCyclingProgrammer

I said it would be business travel.

barnishroader

Apologies, I'm maybe misunderstanding your intention on business travel.

Are you saying that business travel is claimable and it is just commuting isn't?

londoninvestor

barryheffron wrote: »

Are you saying that business travel is claimable and it is just commuting isn't?

Yes - as far as tax is concerned.

What your employer reimburses you for is a matter between you and your employer though, HMRC doesn't dictate that.

If your employer reimburses you for something that is taxable (e.g. your normal commute), you need to pay tax on it as if it were part of your normal income.

Conversely, if your employer doesn't reimburse you for something that is not taxable (e.g. your travel to a temporary site), you can claim tax relief on what you spent out of pocket. This MSE page is useful on claiming such things. It focuses on work uniforms but (apart from the amounts involved) the mechanism of getting the tax back from HMRC should be the same whatever the tax is.

TheCyclingProgrammer

barryheffron wrote: »

Apologies, I'm maybe misunderstanding your intention on business travel.

Are you saying that business travel is claimable and it is just commuting isn't?

Correct. Travel to/from a temporary workplace and other business travel is tax deductible. Ordinary commuting is not.