Reply to: 3 day car hire confusion

[CoolCat]

Hire car can normally be insured "for anything legal", so not drug dealing but any legitimate business use is fine.

[SueEllen]

All I can find around the 'available' is for company cars, not expensed hire cars so guess it's up to the OP.

One think I'm not sure has been mentioned is insurance. If you expect your business to pay for it as an expense and you are travelling on business to your clients you are going to want to mention this to them. Their normal insurance won't cover you as you are clearly not commuting. Not sure if they do the business class 1 thing but bearing in mind you could be classed as using it to carry out your trade (as there is no social use) you would probably need full business insurance.

Putting it through the company and then only taking out social/domestic/commuting means there is no way HMRC is going to accept the expense.

I had a hire car when some bint went into the back of mine. The hire car company can cover you for business travel you just need to tell them what the car is for. Also when workers hire cars to go to another site they also have to be insured for business use as it's not normal commuting.

[northernladuk]

Rather than making stuff up have a read of the rules. Its perfectly acceptable to have it on your drive "if needed for an early morning start". Incidental private use like dropping in for a newspaper on the way to work is also ignored.

All I can find around the 'available' is for company cars, not expensed hire cars so guess it's up to the OP.

One think I'm not sure has been mentioned is insurance. If you expect your business to pay for it as an expense and you are travelling on business to your clients you are going to want to mention this to them. Their normal insurance won't cover you as you are clearly not commuting. Not sure if they do the business class 1 thing but bearing in mind you could be classed as using it to carry out your trade (as there is no social use) you would probably need full business insurance.

Putting it through the company and then only taking out social/domestic/commuting means there is no way HMRC is going to accept the expense.

[CoolCat]

Whether you are considered for paying BIK tax on a company car (and a car hired by the company is a 'company car') is about whether the car was AVAILABLE for personal use, irrespective of whether you use it or not. You'd struggle to convince Her Majesty's Robbing C... that it was a pool car if you are a one person limited company and it was parked on your drive all weekend whilst your own private car was in the garage for repairs.

As an example, if I had a company car available for private use, I pay BIK for all 365 days of the year, not just for the days I actually use it.

The magical words are "wholly and exclusively".

Rather than making stuff up have a read of the rules. Its perfectly acceptable to have it on your drive "if needed for an early morning start". Incidental private use like dropping in for a newspaper on the way to work is also ignored.

[chopper]

Whether you are considered for paying BIK tax on a company car (and a car hired by the company is a 'company car') is about whether the car was AVAILABLE for personal use, irrespective of whether you use it or not. You'd struggle to convince Her Majesty's Robbing C... that it was a pool car if you are a one person limited company and it was parked on your drive all weekend whilst your own private car was in the garage for repairs.

As an example, if I had a company car available for private use, I pay BIK for all 365 days of the year, not just for the days I actually use it.

The magical words are "wholly and exclusively".

[CoolCat]

Why not just pay for one day hire on Monday and one day hire on Friday? Why pay for four days when you don't need them. Or are you simply trying to get our approval to use a business hire car for social/domestic/pleasure at the weekend?

If it's the latter, rent the car, suck up the rental and claim the mileage back instead as though your doing it in your own car.

Probably because to pick a car up when the hire car place opens on a Monday would result in him getting to work late. For most people, unless you live next to the hire car place and have a short journey, you will never get to work on time if you do it that way. Indeed if you need to taxi to the hire car place its a waste of money to keep handing the car back and cheaper to keep it.

Its also worth noting that hire car rates drop significantly the longer you book the car for. So much so that its often cheaper to just book one for a month than to have a week and a few days. Constantly handing a car back is a total waste of money.

As for being laughed at by the revenue so what, its still a legit business reason to use the car, they wont be able to do a thing.

I am very experienced at this stuff. Advice to keep handing the car back is laughable.

[northernladuk]

Maybe he doesn't want to be laughed at by HMRC?

And his colleagues and peers

[LondonManc]

Why not just pay for one day hire on Monday and one day hire on Friday? Why pay for four days when you don't need them. Or are you simply trying to get our approval to use a business hire car for social/domestic/pleasure at the weekend?

If it's the latter, rent the car, suck up the rental and claim the mileage back instead as though your doing it in your own car.

[vwdan]

Why don't you use the car at the weekend to do some "work" for your company, like going shopping for some printer ink or some such? Then it becomes clear cut.

Maybe he doesn't want to be laughed at by HMRC?

[CoolCat]

Why don't you use the car at the weekend to do some "work" for your company, like going shopping for some printer ink or some such? Then it becomes clear cut.

Indeed I have often worked weekends and had client pay for hire car to come in, and not paid any tax on any of the costs of hire car. It was only used for work.

Indeed again when I have been working away from home I have often been driving to the clients city in a hire car on the Sunday evening, to stay there in a hotel during the week, travelling back Friday night or Saturday morning. The idea that I should pay tax for using it at the weekend in these cases is nonsense.

The challenge is only if you use it for non-work use then potentially you need to tax yourself pro rata for the days you have effectively allocated yourself a company car.

If you are going to become liable for company car tax then you can always hire a small van to drop the costs.

None of this is too hard to work out.

[northernladuk]

Could you just claim 45ppm for the work journeys on Friday & Monday?

That would be the sensible thing IMO.

[WTFH]

Could you just claim 45ppm for the work journeys on Friday & Monday?

[SueEllen]

Bit late now but anyhoo.
I presume you're at client site (on Friday) car has broken down and in garage locally (to client site).
You want to hire a car to get you home Friday and to Client site Monday morning?
So why not hire a car for four days and just claim for two ( Friday and Monday)?

On Friday evening it would still be "available for personal" use.

[RSoles]

hi all I have had mixed response's on this from friends wondered if I could have some input.

my personal car is in the garage from Friday. can I hire a hire car for 3 day's to get to and from home and contract. would be no personal journeys jus whilst it is in for repair ?

Bit late now but anyhoo.
I presume you're at client site (on Friday) car has broken down and in garage locally (to client site).
You want to hire a car to get you home Friday and to Client site Monday morning?
So why not hire a car for four days and just claim for two ( Friday and Monday)?

[northernladuk]

Presumably the BIK would be 1/52 of what it would normally be though? Or do company car rules not apply to short term rental?

Dunno. I just can't see why he would put it through the company at all TBH so dunno about the details.