Mileage allowance

[Gagagardener]

I think maybe this should be posted under 'Work or 'Money' but here goes... A young relation, a teacher, has just begun a part-time peripatetic job in a sprawling rural county. Her employer is the county council. She has discovered that the CC pays teachers in this kind of role a lower rate per mile than it pays other staff. (She cannot do the job without a car. Her mileage is measured as if she were leaving a 'base' rather than from her home; her base is 7 miles from where she lives, and because of the geographical relationship of her home, her base and the homes of those she visits, this is never in her favour.) She expected a mileage allowance of 40p+ (42p? 46p?) per mile, but is given - I think - 32p . With rising fuel prices, she fears she cannot afford to keep the job. Does anyone have any experience of this kind of thing? Is there anything she can do?

Where I work there is a higher rate and lower rate, similar to what you describe. She needs to look at the council's policy to see when each rate applies.

The difference between the amount paid at 32p per mile and the HMRC mileage allowance of 45p per mile(for the first 10,000 miles) can be claimed as tax relief from HMRC.

www.gov.uk/tax-relief-for-employees/vehicles-you-use-for-work

If you are using a personal car for work purposes you may be able to claim up to 45p per mile up to the first 10k miles. If the employer doesn't pay this you can claim the difference through "mileage allowance relief’. You can check this on Gov.org website.

Leaving her base is reasonable. The rate does seem a bit stingy but is probably more than it costs her in petrol. The tax relief is worth a small amount extra if she is a basic rate taxpayer. Ultimately she needs to the maths

For tax purposes the HMRC expect you to find your ‘normal’ commute to the workplace, and you can be paid additional mileage when marking work journeys.
If you are paid for the full trip then that is a taxable benefit

If the ‘base’ has never been a normal place of work and they have only worked from home then there is the argument that your friend has a 0 mile commute.

The journey should not be measured from the base unless they are travelling from the base. If she travels from home then her claim should be actual mileage less 7

In many government departments there was the full motor mileage rate MMA and the lower Public Transport Rate PTR (different departments may reword that)
If you chose to travel in your own vehicle then PTR was due, if you were prevented from getting an official vehicle or were ‘required’ to use your vehicle then you got MMA - but only up to a maximum total per year, after which you got PTR

As it’s tax payers money MMA was dropped in many places such as MoD. (And also due to changes in how official fleets are managed)* You can however claim PTR from the employer and then claim tax relief up to MMA

• In the old days there were localised transport pools, if they refused your request for a car due to unavailability then you could claim MMA. When contracts were brought into place with fleet managed vehicles then the contractor would manage and provide cars as required, you could get a ‘fleet’ car or a ‘hire’ car

@name3958
Just to clarify: it is not unusual for different groups of employees to be paid different rates of mileage allowance? That seems unfair to me. I was wondering if there was any point in her consulting her union...

@Gagagardener it depends on the context, amount of miles done, location, it's set out in policy with good justifications, it won't be because of popularity of anything like that.

The geographic base is normal
We had 7 in our LA- the nearest is your starting point- could be next door erupt 30 miles from your home. If your starting school was closer than your base you couldn't claim anything for that 1st journey