The choice between a car allowance and salary sacrifice comes down to a balance of flexibility and value. A cash allowance provides flexibility but offers less value. Salary sacrifice has a more restricted range of choices, but offers the best value, particularly when sourcing a new car. Here’s why.   The hidden costs of a cash allowance When you opt for a cash allowance, you can spend your payments on your choice of vehicle (subject to company rules on the type of car you can drive if you need it for occasional business use), or potentially something else entirely. However, this flexibil ..read more

Demand for car salary sacrifice is growing as an increasing number of companies offer the benefit to their employees. According to data from the British Vehicle Rental and Leasing Association, the salary sacrifice car fleet has risen 68% in a year to nearly 62,000 cars. Many companies have launched salary sacrifice in addition to their company car scheme, to give all eligible employees access to new cars through the business. So, what is attracting so many companies to introduce salary sacrifice car schemes to their drivers? And are there any potential pitfalls? Here, we take a look at what sa ..read more

If you have a company car that is available for private use, including commuting, then it becomes liable for company car tax as a so-called ‘benefit-in-kind’. How much you pay for this benefit is based on the car’s carbon dioxide emissions, so that drivers of the lowest polluting cars pay least tax. With more than one million electric cars on the road, the taxman wants them to start paying their way, but the good news is that it will cost drivers a fraction of what they would pay if they stayed in a diesel or petrol equivalent. Drivers pay company car tax on a percentage of the taxable value o ..read more

Salary sacrifice for a car is exactly the same as any other employee benefit. You exchange some of your salary for a benefit: gym membership; daycare nursery vouchers;  technology equipment; and so on. You could buy any of these items with your take home salary, of course. But the advantage of salary sacrifice is that you pay for these items with your gross salary – that’s the amount before tax and National Insurance is deducted – and then the reduced amount of gross salary is then subject to these taxes. Overall you pay less for the benefit thanks to the tax deductions. Car salary sacrif ..read more

Salary sacrifice is an increasingly popular way of giving all qualifying employees the opportunity to source a new car in a cost-effective way. It allows participants to pay for a car lease with their pre-tax salary, so they can fund their new vehicle with money that would otherwise have gone to the taxman. This makes it an attractive additional choice in a growing array of salary sacrifice benefit options offered by employers to staff, ranging from electric bikes to mobile phones and nursery care. It is also much more cost-effective than offering cash. When benefits are paid as salary, the am ..read more

In January 2024, the rate of National Insurance dropped from 12% to 10%. A further reduction of 2% was announced by the Chancellor in the Spring Budget, seeing a 4% decrease in just three months. But how do these fiscal events affect an employee benefit such as salary sacrifice? Let’s just quickly recap how electric car salary sacrifice works. You ‘sacrifice’ part of your gross salary for a fully expensed electric car (save electricity costs). The savings made by the reduction in tax and National Insurance contribute to making electric car salary sacrifice highly tax efficient – even if there ..read more

Fleet Alliance has made a number of senior appointments to underpin the growth of the fleet management provider as a sustainable mobility business. Among the key appointments is Emma Lovick as the new Head of People and Culture. Emma’s remit is to develop the culture that underpins the business – called ‘Fleet Alliance Loves’, based on Fleet Alliance’s core values of Fairness, Trust, Engagement and Respect – as the company grows in size. Emma has extensive experience within HR and was most recently Head of HR at Mangata Networks UK, a global telecommunications company. Another key appointment ..read more

It was not hard to pick out the Renault stand at this year’s Geneva Show, thankfully revived after five years away, since the number of key manufacturers present were few. But what was presented on the stand was hugely important, and highly relevant in a market that needs stimulation because Renault chose the moment to unveil its new Renault 5 E-Tech. Thankfully little changed from the retro appearance of its original concept shown by Renault in 2021, the new Renault 5 embodies everything that’s good about a French supermini and everything that’s good about an electric vehicle (EV) but at a pr ..read more

Having last week announced that double cabs would undergo a significant change in tax treatment following a 2020 Court of Appeal judgment- see Benefit-in-kind changes reclassify double cabs as cars not vans from July 2024 – HMRC has changed its decision. Following consultation with farmers and the automotive industry on the potential impacts of the tax treatment change, the Government has acknowledged that the 2020 court decision and resultant guidance update could have an impact on businesses and individuals. The Government believes this impact is not consistent with its wider aims to support ..read more

The benefit in kind treatment of double cab pick up trucks will change significantly from 01 July 2024. HMRC has decided that it will no longer follow the VAT treatment of double cabs whereby pickups below 1 tonne were classified as a car, and double cab pick ups above 1 tonne as a van. In most cases double cabs will now be treated as a car for taxation purposes. It means that drivers in a double cab who have traditionally benefited from a flat rate van tax of £792 a year (20%) or £1,584 (40%) will face a significant uplift in tax since most double cabs have high CO2 emissions which will place ..read more