This mileage situation

[Radi06]

I have all my clients in one area, my home is in another area , 20 miles away. I have been getting paid mileage from my home to my client visits. Great.

Prior to this and covid we had an office that we went to at least once a week. The office is neither near my home nor the area where my clients are. We had to go though. Completely opposite direction, also 15 miles. At this time we had to take mileage off from home to office and office to home (30 miles) whether it was an office day or not.

So for two years now we've had no office and worked from home and seen clients.

Now they have opened a tiny office, 2 desks, we are 15 staff. It is in the area where the old office was. Employer expects us to take 30 miles off mileage every day even though I will never go to this office. If I do there will be no desks and I just don't need to.

Is this fair?

When argued we are told that it is an organisation wide policy and that this office is seen as our place of work

It will be as you said that this office is seen as your place of work. I guess that’s in your contract. It doesn’t matter if you go there or not.

my last company wrote me a brand new contract stating that my place of work was my home. This meant that whenever I travelled away from it to go to the nearest office they paid my expenses.

I could have had the same job working from home but they list my place of work as one of their offices. In this scenario they wouldn’t have to pay my expenses to get there.

Yes I know how it works. It just seems very unfair when the place of work is too small to actually work from!

Isn’t this more to do with HMRC Tax rules, and their policies reflect those?

You can’t claim mileage on your “daily commute” so each visit starts from the office (not physically).

Same in my organisation. If I am driving to the City office I claim minus my usual 35 miles from a regional office. It also keeps the number of miles traveled lower - again for tax purposes, as I’m sure there’ something about different taxable rates over 400 (or something) miles claimed in a year.

Your company policy should be available and should explain.

It could be a stipulation from HMRC. You can't claim travel from home to work against tax. As others have said, if the company could change your place of work to your home, that may solve the issue, but I don't know if the tax people would allow that.

But how can it be seen as a place of work when I can't work there and will never go there anyway?

If they made my place of work the area where my clients are it would make more sense.

Is that something they are allowed to do?

Yes mileage is claimed from place of work. Not where you live.