NIM06255 - Class 1 NICs: Expenses and allowances: Travelling expenses: Ordinary commuting and Private travel

The new travel rules, effective from 6 April 1998, provide for the exclusion from NICs of travel and subsistence costs incurred in travelling to or from a place to perform the duties of an office or employment, as long as they are not expenses of ordinary commuting or private travel.

Ordinary commuting

For most employees, ordinary commuting is the journey they make most days between home and their permanent workplace. In general there is no exclusion for the cost of travel between an employee’s permanent workplace and

• an employee’s home, or
• any other place the employee visits for non-work reasons, or
• any place where the employee performs the duties of another job.

See EIM32055, EIM32060 and EIM32065 for more detailed guidance on what constitutes ‘ordinary commuting’ and the definition of ‘workplace’.

Private travel

Costs associated with private travel are not able to be excluded from NICs under the travel rules. See NIM06250 for general guidance on the effect of the new travel rules.

Private travel is any journey between

• an employee’s home and a place which is not a workplace for that employment; or
• any two places neither of which is a workplace for that employment.

See EIM32180 for more detailed guidance on what constitutes private travel.