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Overseas expenses scale rates

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The Income Tax (Approved Expenses) (Amendment) Regulations, SI 2019/358, remove the requirement for employers to check evidence, such as receipts, when using benchmark scale rates to reimburse their employees’ qualifying subsistence expenses when travelling for work. The regulations also bring the concessionary overseas scale rates onto a statutory footing using the power introduced by Finance Act 2019 s 10.

HMRC has updated its table of scale rates for reimbursement of accommodation and subsistence expenses to employees travelling outside the UK. The new rates apply from 6 April 2019. See bit.ly/1FALkgj.

For periods after 5 April 2019, the table has been amended to remove the ‘elsewhere rates’, meaning employers must use the rates applicable to the closest city listed for a particular country.

Payments at or below the published rates will not be liable for income tax or NICs and employers need not include them on forms P11D. These tax and NIC-free amounts are in addition to incidental overnight expenses employers may reimburse under ITEPA 2003 s 240 and the corresponding NICs disregard.

Further guidance on the rates can be found in HMRC’s Employment income manual at EIM05250.

Issue: 1433
Categories: News
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