Money-saving expert Martin Lewis is urging people to claim back up to £280 tax relief if they worked from home during lockdown.
For many of us during the coronavirus lockdowns, our homes became our offices as we changed the way we worked to keep ourselves and each other safe.
Many business had to close their offices and work spaces and millions of UK staff had to temporarily work from home.
Now, the money saving expert has published new advice for people who had to work from home during the coronavirus lockdown.
Many people are unaware of the ‘microservice’ launched by HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) which grants people a whole year’s tax relief even if you only needed to work from home for a day.
The tax relief can be applied for both the 2020/21 and 2021/22 tax years. This means employees could claim up to £280.
If you had to work from home, even if it was just for one day between 6 April 2020 and 5 April 2022, you can still claim if you still have not done so because you can back-claim up to four years.
HMRC has confirmed that claims from employees working from home due to coronavirus measures are eligible for tax relief.
This also applies to those who had to work from home because NHS Track and Trace told you to self-isolate or because you were ‘pinged’ by the NHS app.
The process of claiming the tax relief is relatively simple, Martin explains. To claim, you must have had and declare that you had ‘specific extra costs due to working from home’.
Allocating these costs to areas such as heating and electricity can be difficult, which is why Martin has identified a ‘flat rate’ of £6 a week.
If your employer did not pay expenses for your extra costs resulting from you working from home, you can ask for that amount to be ‘deducted from your taxable income’.
The government’s working-from-home microservice was created in October 2020 to help people claim tax relief during the pandemic. This service can still be used for tax relief claims for the 2020/21 and 2021/22 tax years.
If your claim is accepted, you’ll be paid via cheque or bank transfer.
Martin also has advice for couples who may be interested in making a claim. If two or more people live in the same property and all of you were required to work from home which made costs increase as a result of each individual working from home, all involved can claim.
“I still get swamped with messages from people who can't believe how quick and easy this process is,” Martin said.
You can find more information on the MoneySavingExpert blog here.
