Confusion over truck drivers’ tax allowance

21st March 2016

An error at HMRC has caused confusion about a key tax allowance for truck drivers, according to the Road Haulage Association.

The RHA has a historical agreement over the payment of a round sum allowance to drivers who use sleeper cabs while on a business journey.  The agreement simply requires the employer to be satisfied the driver is away from his normal base and therefore sleeping in his cab.

HMRC has been telling hauliers that, in addition to the above, they need to get proof of purchases from their drivers if they are going to pay an overnight subsistence allowance up to the rate agreed with the RHA – but according to the RHA that is quite wrong.  There is no change to the system.  Drivers have to be genuinely away in their cabs overnight – in a genuine subsistence position – but nothing further is required.

“We have confirmation of that from HMRC,” Jack Semple, the RHA’s Director of Policy, said, “but HMRC inspectors have, in some cases, been imposing new demands on hauliers.  And the website has been incorrect.  It should have been put right immediately and we have made that point to HMRC.

“The overnight subsistence payment is a proper recognition of the realities of the road haulage industry and HMRC should not be seeking to add to the burden of red tape in the way that it functions. 

“More to the point, it has agreed not to do so – but appears to have failed to communicate that internally.  I fear that many hauliers, from the smallest to the very large, may have been told there are changes when there are none; that a more complicated system is being imposed, when that is not the case.”