Claiming back on utility bills as a freelancer working from home

superfriendlyaviator

Hi everyone 👋
I've been a long-term lurker on this forum, there's some great wisdom here.
I can't find an answer to this question, though. I'm a freelancer, and I'm looking for guidance on claiming back on utility bills when working from home.
I've read the government advice (I'm not allowed to post links yet, but it's under the 'if you work from home' heading on the 'expenses if you're self employed' page), but it would be good to get confirmation that I've understood correctly.
I have four rooms in my house, excluding the bathroom. I use one room as an office, and work from home three days a week.
I share the house (and costs) with my partner.
Does this mean I can claim expenses on the amount arrived at with the following process:

• £1800 example total monthly cost for bills and rent
• £900 - my half
• £225 - my half divided by the number of rooms in the house
• £96.43 - my half of one room, divided by 7 (number of week days) multiplied by 3 (number of days I work from home)

Or have I misunderstood? 
Thank you!

unforeseen

If you are a freelancer why aren't you including these costs in your fee to the client? 

JReacher1

unforeseen said:

If you are a freelancer why aren't you including these costs in your fee to the client? 

Probably because it will make their prices uncompetitive 

superfriendlyaviator

I'm happy with the fee I charge to my clients. I don't think they'd be too pleased if they got an itemised breakdown of my utility bills in their invoice, so the question feels a bit irrelevant?
Just trying to understand what's allowable as business expenses and what isn't.

KatrinaWaves

If you look at HMRC you can claim tax relief on around £6 a week. Don’t spend it all at once. 

superfriendlyaviator

This is what I've been looking at: gov.uk/expenses-if-youre-self-employed
There are numerous allowable expenses if you're self employed, which you can claim back VAT on. 

CocoM2020

Why don’t you just use the checker?

superfriendlyaviator

Which checker? I've not seen that.

CocoM2020

It’s at the bottom of the page - click the simplified expenses checker, then the start now on the page it brings you to.

Brynsam

superfriendlyaviator said:

I'm happy with the fee I charge to my clients. I don't think they'd be too pleased if they got an itemised breakdown of my utility bills in their invoice, so the question feels a bit irrelevant?
Just trying to understand what's allowable as business expenses and what isn't.

You don't itemise the bills, you just roll them in to your fee.

Sounds as if you are quite new to this and might benefit from some advice from an accountant, not least on whether you'd fare better working via your own limited company.

superfriendlyaviator said:

This is what I've been looking at: gov.uk/expenses-if-youre-self-employed
There are numerous allowable expenses if you're self employed, which you can claim back VAT on. 

You can only specifically 'claim back VAT' if you are VAT registered. Otherwise it is just a case of claiming the whole expense where this is an 'allowable expense'. 

Link to the simplified expenses checker mentioned above: https://www.gov.uk/simplified-expenses-checker

superfriendlyaviator

I got my wires crossed there with the mention of VAT, I meant expenses that are exempted from being taxable profits. Thanks for pointing that out.
What I'm trying to understand is how to calculate which proportion of household bills are considered allowable expenses. The 'whole expense' you mention isn't the whole bill, it's the proportion of it applicable to the room(s) you work in from home, and the days you work in them.
Do you know whether the example calculation in my first post is the correct way to arrive at the portion of my household bills that is considered an allowable expense?