2 year rule advice/info

**LisaContractorUmbrella** · 5 August 2011, 12:43

Originally posted by Yorkie View Post

My current contract expires in three weeks time, giving a total of 22 months spread over my last two contracts with the same employer. All indications are that another contract will be offered and that new contract will take me over the 24 month limit.

My job role is as a field based engineer in the IT industry, and as such I have no permanent place of work ie I travel to various businesses in various locations throughout the day, never starting my day at the same location as the previous day. Only very occasionally (less than twice per year) do I visit my employer's business location (Headquarters), but this is listed as my employment address.

With my new contract, will I fall foul of the 24 month rule?, and if so are there any legitimate actions I can take so I can still claim travel expenses etc. with my new contract.

I have searched various forums and have struggled to find an answer for my specific circumstances, so any advice/info would be appreciated.

How many sites are you responsible for Yorkie? Do you have a set patch so you visit the same sites each week??

**lje** · 5 August 2011, 13:52

You can claim travel expenses to a temporary place of work. As soon as you know that you will be at a place of work for more than 24 months it is no longer a temporary place of work and you must stop claiming.

However, if you have been at a particular site for less than 40% of your time over the last 24 months then it can still be treated as a temporary place of work and expenses can be claimed.

So the answer is that if you have been at any of the sites you visit for >40% of your time over the last 2 years then you cannot claim travel expenses to that site - but could still claim them to others which are under 40%. If they are all under 40% then you can go on claiming for all of them.

**lje** · 5 August 2011, 13:54

Oh - and I should have said that it isn't just on a site basis - if you are working in one area (eg Manchester) then that may be counted as a single location even if you are on different sites. Then you wouldn't be able to claim the travel expenses.

**Yorkie** · 8 August 2011, 09:18

No real set patch or set customers, work in the Midlands/North on break/fix with customers from home users to multi-nationals logging calls when their Dell/HP/EMC etc. machines fail.

**Yorkie** · 8 August 2011, 09:22

Forgot to add that I don't spend anywhere near to the 40% limit for any single site or geographical area over the last 24 months.

**Greg@CapitalCity** · 8 August 2011, 10:49

Is your home a permanent workplace? For example;
Are you based at home?
Is substantive fee-earning duties undertaken there?
Is it the place the company’s administration and billing takes place?
Is out of hours support services based there?

If so, the temporary workplace question becomes redundant. Travel from a permanent workplace to another permanent/temporary workplace is claimable.

Hope that helps!

**ASB** · 8 August 2011, 11:08

Originally posted by Yorkie View Post

Forgot to add that I don't spend anywhere near to the 40% limit for any single site or geographical area over the last 24 months.

It may be that you have no permanent workplace anyway.

http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/helpsheets/490.pdf

See 1.8 3.9 3.10 et al. If you do not have a permanent workplace you should be OK to carry on claiming. Conversely the IR might try to argue that each place you visit is in fact a permanent workplace - in this case you shouldn't have been claiming anyway.

You could try the hmrc helpline.

**lje** · 8 August 2011, 11:25

Originally posted by Yorkie View Post

Forgot to add that I don't spend anywhere near to the 40% limit for any single site or geographical area over the last 24 months.

Then I don't believe you have an issue. All of the sites continue to be temporary workplaces and you can continue to claim travel expenses.

**Yorkie** · 10 August 2011, 07:51

Many thanks to everyone who has contributed.

2 year rule advice/info