Can’t claim expenses or fuel on agency?

buel

Hi all,

I’m currently working for an education employment agency and chose to be paid by PAYE and not via the ambiguously named umbrella company.

I’ve asked my agency if I can claim fuel costs to and from work, tools purchase to be used or meals and they have said not.

Is this true, please?

[Deleted User]

buel wrote: »

Hi all,

I’m currently working for an education employment agency and chose to be paid by PAYE and not via the ambiguously named umbrella company.

I’ve asked my agency if I can claim fuel costs to and from work, tools purchase to be used or meals and they have said not.

Is this true, please?

Commuting to work can't be claimed. only if the employer offers can you claim traveling in work hrs, to appointments etc otherwise file a tax return.

buel

Thank you.
Filing a tax return will enable me to claim fuel to and from work?
And tools used and meals?

Kim_kim

buel wrote: »

Thank you.
Filing a tax return will enable me to claim fuel to and from work?
And tools used and meals?

Do you mean lunch?
You can’t claim for your lunch.

buel

Kim_kim wrote: »

Do you mean lunch?
You can’t claim for your lunch.

I did.

Please can I ask if there is anything one can claim in my scenario? Also, can you claim things if you are under an umbrella scheme?

Lomast

If you are working under an umbrella you can normally claim reasonable expenses against tax. You can't just claim them back as expenses.
Under paye you can't claim anything unless your employer allows it.

PasturesNew

You could have claimed those things if you'd gone down the umbrella route. You claim the money from yourself in this instance, so the only saving to you is that you don't pay tax on those amounts, you don't get those claims "on top of" your money.

When you choose PAYE you no longer can claim those items. Everybody pays to go to their job, everybody buys their lunch.

What are these tools? It'd be quite normal for trades to possess/buy their own tools.

Comms69

As an agency worker you can claim lunch time meals against your tax allowance, it isn't a lot.


It's not an expenses claim as such, just lowers your tax liability.

LittleVoice

Comms69 wrote: »

As an agency worker you can claim lunch time meals against your tax allowance, it isn't a lot.


It's not an expenses claim as such, just lowers your tax liability.

I was an agency worker for years and didn't know that and so never claimed.

Where do HMRC explain this, please?

Comms69

LittleVoice wrote: »

I was an agency worker for years and didn't know that and so never claimed.

Where do HMRC explain this, please?

It's been 6 years since I had to do it, but payroll actually sorted it for me, so never had to speak to HMRC.

General_Grant

from https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/employment-intermediaries-travel-expense-guidance/travel-and-subsistence-expenses-for-workers-engaged-through-employment-intermediaries-from-6-april-2016

Ordinary commuting and permanent workplaces
The travel expense rules in sections 337 to 342 of ITEPA (including the definitions of ‘ordinary commuting’ and ‘permanent workplace’) set out where tax relief can be applied. In general, tax relief is available for travel and subsistence expenses which workers are obliged to incur and pay for:

travel in the performance of their duties, or
travel to or from a place they necessarily attend in the performance of their duties (excluding ordinary commuting), or
travel between a worker’s home and a ‘temporary’ workplace
Where a worker’s expenses are reimbursed, there’s a corresponding disregard for NICs purposes.

This relief is available provided the journey isn’t ordinary commuting or private travel. No relief is available for ordinary commuting, which is travel between home (or a place that is not a workplace) and a ‘permanent workplace’.

There are a number of criteria for determining if a workplace is temporary or permanent, but in general a workplace will always be a permanent workplace if the worker:

goes to the same workplace in the course of a period of continuous work which lasts or is likely to last more than 24 months, or
goes to the same workplace for all or almost all of the time for which the work