Taxed on expenses at work - is this correct ?

[HomerDancing]

Hi

I have just checked my payslip and seen that my expenses have been added into the gross pay section of my monthly salary and therefore my pension, student loan, tax , NI etc has been worked out based on my total salary including my expenses. Therefore,I have paid tax on my expenses.

The expenses are for a visit to a different office (travel including train fare). I don’t visit this office often and won’t be visiting again for months.

I thought that:
A) expenses were paid separately to payroll and not included in my gross pay. It doesn’t seem right that it’s included in my gross pay as I haven’t actually earned it.
B) I shouldn’t pay tax on the expenses

I have tried looking on the internet but can’t seem to find the right answer!

Please can someone help ?

Thanks

Doesn't sound right to me, ours are paid separately from our salary

Can you speak to your payroll team? Only benefits - company car, private healthcare etc should be taxed not expenses. Otherwise you’d pay, say £100 for a train ticket but only get £80 back.

Thanks

I will speak to them when I get back from holiday. It doesn’t seem right that it goes into whatHMRC think I have earned and that I don’t receive the full amount back on it !

It's not correct, but have you checked that the calculation actually includes the expenses? I've seen it presented this way but only the salary has been taxed.

Are you sure that they have been included in your taxable pay? The software your company uses to calculate the tax etc might show it in the gross pay but not include it in the taxable pay.

Obviously you don't pay tax on reimbursement of expenses but I'm not clear from the way you've worded it that you definitely have

Some expenses are taxable but in the situation you describe they are not. Not a regular place of work, one off etc.

www.gov.uk/expenses-and-benefits-travel

Thanks all for the confirmation !

Just because they've been paid with your salary doesn't mean that they've been taxed. As others have said, they haven't necessarily been included in your pay when tax was calculated.

If you don't often claim expenses, are you able to see if the amount extra you have this month matches the expenses claimed? Eg if your normal take home pay is £1500 per month and the train fare was £100 and you claimed £10 for lunch etc, have you been paid £1610 or something like £1575?

If you have been taxed on the expenses, which you'd have to have a really stupid payroll department for that to have happened, the difference should be large enough to be obvious, as illustrated above.

I pay tax on my mileage expenses but not on reimbursement for tickets/hotel etc.

I get 54p a Mile and it doesn't cost that in petrol so assumed that was why?

It's not correct, but have you checked that the calculation actually includes the expenses? I've seen it presented this way but only the salary has been taxed.

This. My company used to do this and it was hell to work out.
I imagine they got fed up with people asking because now they are paid entirely separately to salary.

My expenses used to be listed on my payslip as a separate field to my wage. It may have looked to some as if it was all one but it wasn’t.
We now get a separate remittance for these and it’s paid separately.

Mine are listed in the same box as my salary but they arent taxed. Guess here isnt another box to put them in lol