Coronavirus - Working From Home + Mileage

ChloeMurphy1

Hi everyone

Asking on behalf of a friend who works for Adult Services for the local Council.  Due to the pandemic she is now working from home but has to complete regular visits to her  clients several times a week (trying to limit to one per day but usually this is not always the case and it can be more than one).  She live some distance away from the area which she covers and would normally drive to work each day, complete visits from her workplace for which she is claiming mileage, and driving home each day.

Her permanent place of work remains the same but she has been told to work from home - should she now be able to claim from home to the visits and return.

Thanks

Chloe

General_Grant

She should.

TELLIT01

In the circumstances it seems reasonable that she should be able to claim the mileage from home, although strictly speaking she should still be claiming mileage as if she was starting from her normal place of work.

General_Grant

TELLIT01 said:

In the circumstances it seems reasonable that she should be able to claim the mileage from home, although strictly speaking she should still be claiming mileage as if she was starting from her normal place of work.

Why is that?

ETA:  Though I would expect the journey claimed to be, eg home - client 1 - client 2 - home rather than return journeys from home to each client.

KatrinaWaves

They could say take off the amount of your normal commute otherwise you’ll be profiting. Who knows though nowadays! 

gettingtheresometime

whenever I had a meeting 1st thing in the morning, I would go straight to the meeting from home and calculate the mileage claimed as Tellit01 said it should strictly be calculated.
I suppose looking at it pragmatically she's saving mileage in not having to travel in every day which she wouldn't be able to claim for in normal circumstances so wouldn't it a case of it balancing out ?

TELLIT01

General_Grant said:

TELLIT01 said:

In the circumstances it seems reasonable that she should be able to claim the mileage from home, although strictly speaking she should still be claiming mileage as if she was starting from her normal place of work.

Why is that?

ETA:  Though I would expect the journey claimed to be, eg home - client 1 - client 2 - home rather than return journeys from home to each client.

You can't normally claim for the commuting distance from home to work and back.  As an example, I lived about 30 miles North from our office and had to attend meeting some 60 miles North of where I live.  I could only claim 60 - 30 miles (normal commute).

In your situation, all you can do is check your total mileage each day and subtract your normal commute from the total.  I would also check with your employer for their interpretation as some are more lenient/generous with interpretation.

Andy_L

ChloeMurphy1 said:

Her permanent place of work remains the same but she has been told to work from home - should she now be able to claim from home to the visits and return.

Thanks

Chloe

Depends on her employer's rules for T&S. They may pay the lot or say she deducts her normal commute milage

LondonLiz

To be scrupulously correct to follow the HMRC rules why not simply ask the employer to temporarily change the 'normal place of work' as a variation to contract?  I can't see why a good employer would say no in current circumstances though i guess some might.  Surely worth asking.

ChloeMurphy1

Just to clarify, she has been asked to do only one visit per day.

Thanks for all the advice.