Temporary Workplace Rules​

Temporary Work PlacesHow far apart do sites have to be to count as separate, temporary workplaces?

The travel tax rebate rules say you can get tax relief on journeys to and from temporary workplaces. In general, that means places where you'll be working for 24 months or less. It seems simple enough but, as with most tax rules, it can get fiddly at times. For instance, it can make a difference if you switch to another site that's close to the previous one. Also, if there's little difference in your travel costs to the new site, the taxman might argue it doesn't count as separate.

Here's what the rules actually say:

“The basic principle is that a change in the location or boundaries of a workplace will give rise to a new workplace where the change has a significant effect on:

the journey an employee has to make to get to work, and in particular

the cost of that journey.”

HMRC booklet 490: Employee travel, section 4.7

So, for a new workplace to count as separate from the old, both the travel cost and physical journey made must be different. As you can imagine, there's quite a lot of wiggle room in the definitions here. Of the two factors, though, the cost is usually the main decider. If you think you may have been travelling to different temporary work sites in the last 4 years, use our quick and free mileage calculator to see how much you could be entitled to claim back.

Temporary Workplace Distance RulesHow far apart do workplaces have to be to count as separate under the 24 month rule?

For a workplace to be temporary, you need to be there for under 24 months. If you end up staying longer, then you'll stop getting your tax relief once those first 2 years are over. Even agreeing to stay for longer can mean the site gets classed as permanent by HMRC.

When you move to another workplace, HMRC will decide whether it counts as separate. If it's too close, or the travel costs are too similar, it might end up not counting. The trap here is that you're considered to have accepted a permanent workplace when you agree to move to the new site. Worse still, your old site suddenly no longer counts as temporary either.

Here's an example:

• Bob starts at site A, he’s told from the outset that he’ll be there for 18 months.
• After 12 months, he’s told that once his 18 months at site A are up, he’ll be moving to site B. Site B's just a short hop from his current route to site A, and the same distance from his home.
• He’s told he’ll be at site B for 18 months.
• There is no major difference in the length or cost of Bob's journey. HMRC tells Bob they're basically the same site.
• At the 12-month point, Bob’s expecting his total time on sites A and B to be 36 months. The taxman says this breaks the 24-month limit for temporary workplaces.
• Bob can claim for the first 12 months at site A, but not the last 6. They fall after he agreed to work on site B, which is when the site became "permanent".

As a result, Bob can’t claim anything at all for travel to site B. Again, there are grey areas and pitfalls to watch out for, and every case is likely to be different. As always, though, if there's a genuine claim to be made, we'll always battle HMRC to get your refund paid. 

Another example would be if you posted at the Naval base in Portsmouth or Plymouth and have to visit different parts of each town, then those locations would not count due to the distance and you wouldn't be able to claim.

The temporary workplace rules are some of the hardest things to get your head around in tax refund law. RIFT will always fight your corner, but we'll never waste your time trying to claim more than you're entitled to. That's how you know your refund's safe. Even if the taxman ever changed his mind and demanded some of it back, we'd pay it ourselves. That's our unique RIFT Guarantee. If we say you're owed money, you can take it to the bank.