claiming tax relief for working from home since 2013

Cathy_Bob

I am not currently working after losing my job at the end of Jan 2021. 
I worked from home 3 days a week from 2013-03-01 and then was permanently home-based effective from 2016-03-01.
During that time, I have not claimed any tax relief for working from home as my employer, I believe erroneously, advised that this was not possible.
Can I claim the relief backdated to when I initially started working from home?
If so, how do I do this?
Thank you for any help

unforeseen said:

Was it your choice to work from home? 

When I first started working from home back in 2013, my employer stated that it was voluntary, but they were moving from office space that would accommodate all the staff permanently based in those premises, plus others who were field-based for when they had monthly meetings to managed office space (a Regus site) where there were insufficint desks to accommodate all of the staff permanently based in the previous site on a daily bases. Days in the office were split between those staff with some required to go to the office 3 days a week and others required to go to the office 2 days a week. I fell into the latter group and attended on Tuesdays and Thursdays.
As such, it was not a voluntary arrangement. 

Note, I will re-post my initial question in the Cutting Tax forum as suggested above.

Jeremy535897

It should be stated in your contract of employment that you were required to work from home, although I think things have been a little less formal for COVID related WFH. The time limit for past claims is 4 years.

Cathy_Bob

Jeremy535897 said:

It should be stated in your contract of employment that you were required to work from home, although I think things have been a little less formal for COVID related WFH. The time limit for past claims is 4 years.

Thank you...
I believe my contract from March 2016 definitely stated place of work = home (I have a copy of that one)
How do I go back 4 years?
The link I have is just for the 20/21 tax year - working-from-home-v3 – PPI Tax Rebate

Dazed_and_C0nfused

Cathy_Bob said:

Jeremy535897 said:

It should be stated in your contract of employment that you were required to work from home, although I think things have been a little less formal for COVID related WFH. The time limit for past claims is 4 years.

Thank you...
I believe my contract from March 2016 definitely stated place of work = home (I have a copy of that one)
How do I go back 4 years?
The link I have is just for the 20/21 tax year - working-from-home-v3 – PPI Tax Rebate

That link is for a private company.  Why are you asking about this on here and then paying a company to make the claim on your behalf?  Odd, very odd.

9. Price and payment

(9.1) In consideration of you assigning to us the legal and equitable interest to any tax rebate arising as a result of the tax rebate submission that you request us to make for you, we shall pay to you an amount equal to 52% of any such tax rebate (the “Price”).

Cathy_Bob

Dazed_and_C0nfused
Sorry, I hadn't realised it was a business link...
The last year or so has been pretty awful for me mental-health wise...
I've not used that link and would never pay anyone to sort this out for me - I haven't got any funds to do so in any case, hence why I'm looking into trying to claim back this tax...

Dazed_and_C0nfused

As you aren't making a Covid-19 WFH claim it might be simplest to send a brief letter direct to HMRC using the contact details on gov.uk.

If you are eligible to claim this relief then providing HMRC have your claim by 5 April 2022 you could include the 2017:18, 2018:19, 2019:20, 2020:21 and 2021:22 tax years.

You are too late to claim for anything prior to 6 April 2017.

The simplified rate was £4/week for the years to 2019:20 and then £6/week for 2020:21 and later years.

Remember you receive tax relief on the allowable expenses so it is likely to save you between £0 and £83 for each of the earlier years and £0 and £125 for the later years.

For most people it will be approx £40 for the first three years and £60 for the later two.

All of the above assume you don't owe HMRC more than the usual £1/£2 people on PAYE usually owe each year.

sheramber

you can make a claim through this 

https://www.gov.uk/tax-relief-for-employees/working-at-home

It does say you will be able to claim for previous years

Cathy_Bob

Dazed_and_C0nfused said:

As you aren't making a Covid-19 WFH claim it might be simplest to send a brief letter direct to HMRC using the contact details on gov.uk.

If you are eligible to claim this relief then providing HMRC have your claim by 5 April 2022 you could include the 2017:18, 2018:19, 2019:20, 2020:21 and 2021:22 tax years.

You are too late to claim for anything prior to 6 April 2017.

The simplified rate was £4/week for the years to 2019:20 and then £6/week for 2020:21 and later years.

Remember you receive tax relief on the allowable expenses so it is likely to save you between £0 and £83 for each of the earlier years and £0 and £125 for the later years.

For most people it will be approx £40 for the first three years and £60 for the later two.

All of the above assume you don't owe HMRC more than the usual £1/£2 people on PAYE usually owe each year.

Thank you... 
That's so helpful!
I know it won't be a huge amount of money, but every little bit helps right now...
I'm pretty certain I don't owe anything to HMRC as I've already had a tax rebate from them for the 2020/21 tax year that obviously didn't take account of any WFH as I'd never claimed for it before...
Thank you once again

[Deleted User]

Cathy_Bob said:

Dazed_and_C0nfused said:

As you aren't making a Covid-19 WFH claim it might be simplest to send a brief letter direct to HMRC using the contact details on gov.uk.

If you are eligible to claim this relief then providing HMRC have your claim by 5 April 2022 you could include the 2017:18, 2018:19, 2019:20, 2020:21 and 2021:22 tax years.

You are too late to claim for anything prior to 6 April 2017.

The simplified rate was £4/week for the years to 2019:20 and then £6/week for 2020:21 and later years.

Remember you receive tax relief on the allowable expenses so it is likely to save you between £0 and £83 for each of the earlier years and £0 and £125 for the later years.

For most people it will be approx £40 for the first three years and £60 for the later two.

All of the above assume you don't owe HMRC more than the usual £1/£2 people on PAYE usually owe each year.

Thank you... 
That's so helpful!
I know it won't be a huge amount of money, but every little bit helps right now...
I'm pretty certain I don't owe anything to HMRC as I've already had a tax rebate from them for the 2020/21 tax year that obviously didn't take account of any WFH as I'd never claimed for it before...
Thank you once again

sheramber has provided the correct link above - and it does ask for how many years you wish to claim!

Cathy_Bob

[Deleted User] said:

Cathy_Bob said:

Dazed_and_C0nfused said:

As you aren't making a Covid-19 WFH claim it might be simplest to send a brief letter direct to HMRC using the contact details on gov.uk.

If you are eligible to claim this relief then providing HMRC have your claim by 5 April 2022 you could include the 2017:18, 2018:19, 2019:20, 2020:21 and 2021:22 tax years.

You are too late to claim for anything prior to 6 April 2017.

The simplified rate was £4/week for the years to 2019:20 and then £6/week for 2020:21 and later years.

Remember you receive tax relief on the allowable expenses so it is likely to save you between £0 and £83 for each of the earlier years and £0 and £125 for the later years.

For most people it will be approx £40 for the first three years and £60 for the later two.

All of the above assume you don't owe HMRC more than the usual £1/£2 people on PAYE usually owe each year.

Thank you... 
That's so helpful!
I know it won't be a huge amount of money, but every little bit helps right now...
I'm pretty certain I don't owe anything to HMRC as I've already had a tax rebate from them for the 2020/21 tax year that obviously didn't take account of any WFH as I'd never claimed for it before...
Thank you once again

sheramber has provided the correct link above - and it does ask for how many years you wish to claim!

I'll use that link then - probably quicker than writing a letter and awaiting a response...