Personal phone bought for business (PAYE employee)

bluphoto

My employer expects me to have a mobile phone so I’m always contactable, but this is not supplied by the business.
My iPhone packed up last night, and as I hardly make any personal calls nowadays, I probably wouldn’t have bothered replacing it.
Instead though, I’ve set up a new contract, so I can support my employers expecatations.
I self assess, so intend to put these expenses in as a business expense.

Should there be any issues with this? Would I have to prove anything?

Thanks
Guy

uknick

Will your employer reimburse you for calls?

As an employee, the expense has to be wholly, exclusively and necessary to do your job.
I think you'll need something from your employer in writing stating you have to have one and they won't provide it. You'll also need to keep all the bills to prove no personal use.

TheCyclingProgrammer

Tax relief is available for a phone supplied by the business (typically where the employer pays for the phone and the contract is in the employer's name) even if its for both business and personal use but I don't think you can claim tax relief on a phone paid for out of your own pocket unless you can show it was purchased wholly, exclusively and necessarily for business purposes. The only tax relief available is on itemised business calls.

Sibbers123

No you cannot claim tax relief for the cost of the mobile (well you can but it would be incorrect and fraudulent to do so).

You need to have incurred the expense wholly, exclusively and necessarily for reason of employment. The fact that you will be able to use the phone personally, regardless of whether you do or not would mean you are not entitled to tax relief unfortunately.

You should've asked your employer to fund your phone and if they agreed it would've been a tax free benefit.

If you were self-employed the rules are more lax, and you could claim tax relief for the business proportion, but this is not the case for an employee.

bluphoto

Ok thanks all. I will cancel my contract (still well within cooling off period) and let my employer know that they will need to provide me with a dedicated phone.

TheCyclingProgrammer

bluphoto wrote: »

Ok thanks all. I will cancel my contract (still well within cooling off period) and let my employer know that they will need to provide me with a dedicated phone.

FWIW, it doesn't have to be dedicated exclusively to business use if the employer arranges and supplies the phone and contract for tax relief purposes (your employer may have a policy on personal use however).

badmemory

If you don't use it for personal use then a cheapo PAYG should be good enough!

DCFC79

Get a dual sim phone, saves carrying 2 phones on you.