Use of Home as Office - Self Assessment Tax questions.

Mr_Whisker

Im filling in my HMRC self-assessment tax return as a sole trader. I work exclusively from home, approximately 80 hours per week, and I wanted to know if I can claim any/ or some of my interest-only mortgage payments, service charge etc as an expense under the use of home as business premises?

I don’t want to complicate anything that could lead to Capital Gains tax issues however. 

Any advice would be extremely appreciated 

Bookworm105

Use the business use proportion to work out a percentage of your:

• Council tax
• Home insurance, unless your business is covered by a separate policy
• Mortgage interest (not repayments of the capital, you can't claim any of that)
• Rent, if you rent your home from a landlord (as a sole trader you can’t claim to rent a room from yourself)
• General household repairs and maintenance, for example repairs to the roof (but you can't claim for redecoration to a room that has no business use)
• Water rates, unless your business use of home is "minor" - e.g. you’re a jobbing gardener writing up your books at home. Because HMRC don't think you'd use extra water for that, they won't let you claim any.

Other costs you could include are:

• Business telephone calls
• A proportion of your landline rental, based on the ratio of business to private calls that you make (assuming you're using one landline for both business and private calls)
• A proportion of your broadband, based on the ratio of business to private Internet use

The guidance...
BIM47820 - Specific deductions: use of home: specific expenses - HMRC internal manual - GOV.UK

the examples
BIM47825 - Specific deductions: use of home: examples - HMRC internal manual - GOV.UK

Mr_Whisker

Thank you so much for clarifying all this for me. I really appreciate it 

Bookworm105

Mr_Whisker said:

Thank you so much for clarifying all this for me. I really appreciate it 

please note that the apportionment is by both time and area since the last thing you want to do is claim exclusive use of a given area as making it 100% business use exposes you to potential CGT issues when you sell and muddies the council tax water.

look at examples 4 & 6