Home Workers - Travel Expenses - General - Flexible and hybrid working

5 Home Workers - Travel Expenses

Gemma | 0 Posts

2 Jun, 2023 08:52

Morning Everyone,

We're looking at our travel and expense policy for home workers, particularly how far away they have to be from the office in order to claim travel expenses for travelling to the office.

Our VP of Operations is keen to encourage people who are home workers to visit the office more (and includes herself in this as well) but one barrier to this we've identified is that the travel and expense policy set by our US HQ states that home workers are not eligible to claim expenses for the cost of visiting a company office within 75 miles of their home office.

The expense policy is set and written by the US HQ so this is not something the UK had any input into (it was changed without our knowledge), obviously for the US this works given the size of the country and that remote workers travelling to the office there will be going to an entirely different state so has yet to become an issue.

However for the UK this doesn't work and I've been asked to find out what other companies in the UK do in regards to travel expenses for remote workers and what distances from the office are applied (if any) for them to be able to claim travel costs to/from the office location.

We're hoping to gather some information so that we can leverage HQ to add an adjustment in for the UK. Hoping the community may be able to help with this.

Thank you

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Agnes | 0 Posts

4 Jun, 2023 22:39

To avoid any misunderstandings and potential breaches of contract, it's best to review employees' T&Cs first. If their permanent workplace is listed as their home address, there may already be a clause that clarifies what distance can be claimed as an expense.
If, however, their permanent workplace is the office, then commuting is not usually considered an expense because it is considered a personal journey (just like you cannot claim it as an expense on your tax return). If you would decide to pay someone as an incentive, you should make it clear it’s not a contractual agreement and can be changed at any time, so it doesn’t become a very expensive implied term of employment.
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Gemma | 0 Posts

5 Jun, 2023 08:35

In reply to Agnes:
Hi Agnes

There's nothing contractual about our expense policy, it is set globally by our HQ in the US. Our employment contracts only set place of work, in this case "home" not what distances can be claimed as an expense.

We're not looking to change their contracts or force them to the office, we are trying to encourage people to visit the office a bit more often and also for the occassions when they need to attend the office for some reason actually improve things for them by making it easier to claim travel expenses.

At the moment the only home workers who can claim travel expenses under the global policy are those living more than 75 miles from the office. Anyone closer to the office (less than 75 miles from the office) and employed as a home worker cannot claim any travel expenses for visiting the site.

I'm looking to try and get some kind of benchmark of what other business do. Have you set a distance in your expense policy that home workers must be X number of miles from the office in order to claim expenses or is there no such restriction, i.e. any home worker can claim their travel costs even if they were only lets say 10 miles away.

Thanks
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Agnes | 0 Posts

5 Jun, 2023 11:21

In reply to Gemma:
In the case of our remote employees, we reimburse the mileage regardless of the distance.
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Maya | 0 Posts

5 Jun, 2023 19:41

I’ve recently moved to a fully-remote company, with employees based across the U.K.

We’re updating contracts to make all employees’ homes their place of work, and allowing them to claim to drive to the office, minus 15 miles. The nominal 15 miles is so that the people who live relatively close to the office and choose to come in regularly then don’t claim for what is essentially a commute. Anyone coming in by public transport can claim the full amount.

It’s not in place yet as a policy, so I’ve no idea how well it will work! We’re not trying to encourage people in to the office though - it’s too small for that to work particularly effectively.

The contractual change is required because the company has become fully remote due to covid - pre-covid they were much more office-based!
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Gemma | 0 Posts

6 Jun, 2023 08:51

In reply to Maya:
Thanks Maya, that's really helpful :)
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