Christmas gifts from your company (and from the tax man!): Part 1

Working from home allowance – up to £98 per person

All employees who work from home are entitled to be paid a £3 per week tax-free home working allowance.

You do not have to pay this week by week. Instead you can choose to pay it as a lump sum (e.g. to coincide with Christmas). This means that £156 can be paid as a tax-free lump sum now, which would save tax of £62 for a higher rate tax payer, plus National Insurance savings of up to £20 for the company and £16 for the employee – a total saving of £98 per person!

Note that for the purpose of this rule, ‘employees’ are anyone on the payroll and any director or company secretary of the company.

• The £3 allowance can be paid for each week in which some work is done from home. This includes business-related phone calls, logging on to do emails or other computer-based work, bookkeeping and even discussing business issues with your spouse or partner!
•  If you decide to make this £156 payment, you just need to record it in your accounts as: ‘Home working allowance for [name] for [1.1.2009 to 31.12.2009]‘. No other paperwork is needed.
• If you are an employee/director of more than one company, it would appear that you can claim the allowance for every employer company.
• If you are already making a claim in your accounts for “rent of home” or “use of home as office” or similar, this is likely to include the £156 so no extra claim can be made.  

Click here for Employee entertaining

Please get in touch with your usual contact at K&H for more information.