Diggers' Forum survey on travel and away working

[Oxbeast]

One of the issues that I hope this survey might highlight are companies which pay different subs to staff of different grades...
I'd love to see some industry standards, as in the rest of construction.

[gwyl]

One of the issues that I hope this survey might highlight are companies which pay different subs to staff of different grades...

this is indeed one of the purposes of the survey, as too often the conditions from one employer to the next are murky; does employer X count from the office in the morning whereas employer Y from the moment you are on site; is travelling time something that everyone must accept, regardless, or if you are driving to site with 3 or 4 people snoozing and farting in the back, is it fair that with their welfare in your hands, that you must just lump it that you are on 'travelling time' - conversely, is it fair for someone to be paid to snooze and fart in the back of a vehicle while some other bugger has to be wide-awake and on the ball to drive them to site, and each gets the same loot for the voyage?
these are some of the questions to which we are trying to obtain answers. the more respond the more of a broad data-set we will have to make sense of work conditions.

[the invisible man]

Basically if it's a company van/minibus/4x4 then it is a workplace, whether you're driving or snoozing/farting (or any combination of the above...) and you are thus at work and should be paid for it. Complications are your defined place of work. If it's a "home" job and the van takes you from the office, where you are "employed", this should apply. Your "travel" time is from home to office. If you are on a job-specific contract then your place of work is the site, and if a bus is provided to help you get there it could be construed as giving you a lift - as for example some big employers with factories/offices out of town (there used to be some in the UK) sometimes run a minibus service from the town centre.

Construction is not actually that unified and standardized. Almost everyone on a buidling site will be working for subcontractors: many will be on an "away" job basis, others wil be local.

[trowelmonkey]

Doesn't that show the unfairness of designating the site hut as the "place of work," as especially as many sites don't allow private cars to be parked on them, in effect forcing people to travel to the unit, sometimes for an hour in the wrong direction, in order to be herded into a van? Almost every job involves commuting to some extent. It's the daily double commuting (home-office-site) that eats up so much of the day. On some jobs I've spent over 5 hours a day in transit and still worked a full day. That starts to eat into sleep time and everybody gets grumpy.

Actually, I've lots of issues with the generic "site" being the designated place of work, but one little rantlette at a time.

[gwyl]

Basically if it's a company van/minibus/4x4 then it is a workplace, whether you're driving or snoozing/farting (or any combination of the above...) and you are thus at work and should be paid for it.

should and are, as well you know are not necessarily the way things function; dare i say, lest it create a precedent

Complications are your defined place of work.

absolutely; thing is i have been told that 'since i don't live round here, and yes you are providing me with accommodation, despite it being a 'home' job for the unit, it's an away job for me - and i depend on the subs, which you aren't paying me'
for this reason a baseline study is needed before anyone can make any assumptions on how things should be; how they are currently is the essential data-sourcing exercise in the first place; furthermore @trowelmonkey the daily commute, necessary and unnecessary, is another issue to be resolved.
sometimes these are poor management decisons: sending X to work where Y lives, and so on down the line...
not very green, if nothing else

[kevin wooldridge]

There is a flaw in the argument that you travel 'in your own time' if the transport is supplied free by your employer. In the same way that accomodation becomes a taxable item if it is supplied on a place of work basis, surely transport is also a taxable benefit if it is supplied to take you free to a designated 'place of work'.......Is there a danger here of uncovering a futher can of worms (as with the taxable accomodation) that none of us want to see uncovered....?

[Wax]

I may be wrong with this but as I understand it if you are self employed you usual place of work is your office ( home if you do not have an office). If you are self employed but visiting the same office or site on a daily basis as part of a contract you can claim travel expenses (including parking) for up to two years visiting the same place on a daily basis or so I was told on a self assesment course run by the tax office. If the company you have a self employed contract with pays your expenses you have to declare that to the tax office but you are unlikley to have to pay tax on it unless it is above the tax office recomended rates.

If you are employed on PAYE your company can pay you expenses if you are away from your normal place of work, however they can pay what they like and you then can claim any deficit as a tax rebate or have to pay extra tax if the Tax people think it is more than their accepted guide lines( very unlikely in archaeology!). If you are PAYE on a short site specific contract then that site is your place of work and you can not claim anything for travel.

They key seems to be understand the terms and conditions under which you are employed and understand your tax situation. If you have to fork out for protective clothing or provide yourself with a car to be able to work (not just getting to the office or back) find out where you stand tax wise as there are things you can claim back on tax especially if you are a low earner.

The employer is supposed to tell the tax office what expenses and subsidies they are paying to their employees and some of them are probably not too straight about this and could get into trouble with the tax office.

What is needed is good advice from the tax people about what you can and cannot claim and do not rely on your employer to tell you what you are entitled to. This is readily available along with free courses on selfemployment and self assesment

What counts as work time or travel time is up to the terms and conditions of your contract .... you do have a contract?

As I said at the begining I may be wrong on this

[kevin wooldridge]

As I said at the begining I may be wrong on this

No Wax i think you are pretty close to the correct interpretation.

I enquired of the tax office anumber of years back whether I could claim travelling expenses incurred at work if my employer did not reimburse me. (this was whilst I was on PAYE and not self-employed). I was told if I had to go to my office/place of work in the morning, I couldn't claim the cost of travel. However if I then incurred expenses travelling from my office to other sites AND my employer did not reimburse me for that travel, I could legitimately claim that as a travel expense. BUT at the same time they told me. If my employer paid for the cost of travel between my house and the office (even if that travel was 'free' i.e a lift to work) that was a benefit for which Icould be liable for tax. I mean that seemed pretty straight forward to me, but of course unless the taxman picks you up on it, it isn't one of the things you want to advertise.

The problem with the accomodation/tax expense shocker a couple of years back was that nobody told any of us poor sods caught out by the Revenue that the accomodation we had gratefully received for all those weeks/months etc should have been taxed so it was a bit of shock to suddenly find a big deduction as the tax man claimed his money back. I suspect that a malicious tax official could do the same with the 'free' travel to work perk if they wished. Which is why it would be good to get the matter resolved, but I suspect it will not be to most peoples benefit.....

[chiz]

Hi Kevin,
it’s a good point you make about the Revenue, my personal view is that is better to be able to make a decision from an informed position rather than get nailed at a later date. It would be all of us paying the bill after all. The Revenue doesn’t take ‘but I didn’t know…’ as an excuse.



The DF is aware that the survey could throw up results that run contrary to perceived opinion, and in some respects the initial data is doing just that. When discussing whether to hold the survey the possibility was taken into account that it might result in some negative side effects but it was felt that the need for transparency outweighed the possible downsides. Once we have the data and know what questions need asking of the taxman, then we’ll be asking those questions.

What the DF are aiming to do is collect data on current practices, and how they affect both employees (and the employer). Initial data suggests a wide variety of experiences of away work and travel across the UK -this is partly due to different types of employers, and the different type of work they carry out. The DF want to find out what this range of practice is, and then look to see what steps could be taken to make life better for everyone. Hopefully at the end of this process diggers will be in a better position to judge what they are being offered, and the tax situation will be just one part of this.



By shining a light on what the current situation is we can hopefully make it easier for diggers to see the true value of any potential employment. Whilst I know that some will consider that at the moment any employment would be a bonus, the advertised basic-level pay is only part of the story. If you work for the right unit you can apparently make over ?3,000 a year tax-free on top of basic salary, plus more for driving –and some diggers are doing just that, work for the wrong unit and you end up paying a huge amount just to get to work. But both jobs can carry the same salary in an advert…

As we both know English Heritage managed to solve the ‘problem’ of tax liability on provided accommodation for temporary staff by making arrangements the taxman, my understanding is that this is not the only employer that has made such an arrangement. One of the questions we will be putting to employers is whether they have checked whether any payments they make are liable for tax!

With your example, as I read it, yes: as long as you go to the employer’s yard under your own steam you aren’t taxed on travel from that point onwards. This seems to follow the same tax logic as the tax situation on accommodation, company cars, mileage etc etc as I understand it. If you are on a bone fide away job, then the transport is usually from temporary accommodation supplied by your employer to the site (which is only a temporary place of work: the travel is required by your work and therefore not a perk?). I think there may be a misunderstanding creeping in about claiming back expenses from the taxman whilst actually on PAYE?

[gwyl]

these are the issues that need some transparency; it all seems to me a bit of 'a bloke told me down the pub that...'

@chiz - what do you mean by

I think there may be a misunderstanding creeping in about claiming back expenses from the taxman whilst actually on PAYE?