Sole trader - Calculating petrol expenses..

condra

Hi all,

Anyone know of a simple way to calculate/manage petrol expenses when a vehicle is used for both business and personal. Currently I'm keeping petrol receipts and writing the journeys on the back for reference, eg "home to Ashbourne, to Swords, then home"..

When doing my taxes will I need to calculate the costs of all journeys based on my vehicles fuel efficiency and the distances traveled?

markmoto

condra wrote: »

Hi all,

Anyone know of a simple way to calculate/manage petrol expenses when a vehicle is used for both business and personal. Currently I'm keeping petrol receipts and writing the journeys on the back for reference, eg "home to Ashbourne, to Swords, then home"..

When doing my taxes will I need to calculate the costs of all journeys based on my vehicles fuel efficiency and the distances traveled?

Get your self DCI fuel card, petrol/diesel and all commercial use put on the card so you have nicely organized invoices etc

Darc19

markmoto wrote: »

Get your self DCI fuel card, petrol/diesel and all commercial use put on the card so you have nicely organized invoices etc

But be very very vigilant on the prices they charge and understand that they quote excluding vat.

Recently I compared prices with someone else. I was on 1.07 + vat for diesel. He was 1,21+vat. He never really noticed

markmoto

Darc19 wrote: »

But be very very vigilant on the prices they charge and understand that they quote excluding vat.

Recently I compared prices with someone else. I was on 1.07 + vat for diesel. He was 1,21+vat. He never really noticed

DCI price update by email every Friday.
But recently they got new card option called PumpSaver, automatically 5 cents off the pump original price.

mickdw

I operate as a sole trader using my car for business and personal use.
I keep all fuel receipts and on tax return at end if year, you input full fuel cost and then percentage personal use is deducted.
What i do is keep a notebook. Takes 2 mins on a saturday evening . Record work trips for the previous week. No great detail and an approx mileage overall.
When doing my tax return, i look at years mileage on the car, then add up all the weeks business mileage as noted each saturday - that is then used to come up with percentage business use. This I imagine is more than 90 percent of people do but ive no idea if it would satisfy revenue in an audit but i dont see how you could realistically do any more alongside actually working.
All the other car costs go in similarly - full insurance, tax, maintenance etc goes in and then the business percentage decides tge portion that is claimable.
Your car purchase cost can be dealt with a few ways depending how you bought etc but again the business percentage dictates how much is claimable.

hold my beer

Ye are going into far too much detail. An estimate of personal use v business use for the year as a total will suffice i.e. look at total spend, and put a % that is personal. Revenue will accept it if it's reasonable

Gloomtastic!

I claim 85% of car expenses for business at tax return stage.

If you get your vehicle branded or stick a decal on the side/window, theoretically your vehicle is working for you 100% of the time so you can claim 100% of car expenses.

Remember VAT is not reclaimable on petrol only diesel.

salad17

I put my fuel into my excel sheet and calculate it as 75% expense and the rest is for personal. No need to go into extreme detail.

mickdw

salad17 wrote: »

I put my fuel into my excel sheet and calculate it as 75% expense and the rest is for personal. No need to go into extreme detail.

I dont know how they behave in this regard should an audit arise but its no harm to have the notes re useage.
I generally dont go above 50 percent business so its unlikely to be challenged.
The percentage used can mean big savings though so im sure they keep an eye on it.

Sleeper12

Darc19 wrote:

Recently I compared prices with someone else. I was on 1.07 + vat for diesel. He was 1,21+vat. He never really noticed

They start you off about 10c below forecourt prices and within a few months you can be paying way over. Last time I used them they were very expensive for petrol.

markmoto

Sleeper12 wrote: »

They start you off about 10c below forecourt prices and within a few months you can be paying way over. Last time I used them they were very expensive for petrol.

DCI have new/additional card scheme 5 cents off the pump price you are filling at.

But if you are in Haulage business you would have to use 2 or 3 different fuel providers and compare each week to see who is offering better deals.
DCI, Morgan Fuel, AS24 etc

Sleeper12

markmoto wrote:

DCI have new/additional card scheme 5 cents off the pump price you are filling at.

That's not bad. I couldn't handle the hassle of taking the price texted to me, adding the vat & comparing to the pump prices. If pump was cheaper then it obviously wouldn't be on their invoice so the selling point of it being all on one invoice didn't work for me. Then there was an annual standing charge. It was nuts. Too much work for me

markmoto

Sleeper12 wrote: »

That's not bad. I couldn't handle the hassle of taking the price texted to me, adding the vat & comparing to the pump prices. If pump was cheaper then it obviously wouldn't be on their invoice so the selling point of it being all on one invoice didn't work for me. Then there was an annual standing charge. It was nuts. Too much work for me

The new scheme called PumpSaver and you can use in any fuel pump.

Cilldara_2000

hold my beer wrote: »

Ye are going into far too much detail. An estimate of personal use v business use for the year as a total will suffice i.e. look at total spend, and put a % that is personal. Revenue will accept it if it's reasonable

This works practically.

The OP is I think going down the wrong rabbit hole anyway. EG a receipt for €50 petrol with some work journey of, say, 50km on the back doesn't make sense. The strictly correct way would be to write down the mileage of all your work journeys in the year as they happen, deduct this from your total mileage for the year, and prorate from there.

condra

Thanks for all the replies.

Sleeper12

condra wrote:

Thanks for all the replies.

I don't think it's been mentioned but don't forget to notify your insurance company. Domestic car insurance is for private use. If you do use it for business even a portion of the time the you will need a different tyre of policy

condra

I was gonna ask but didn't want to go off topic. Thanks though, I'll get in touch with them during the week. If they ask for more money, I'm guessing I can claim some of that as expenses too.

Sleeper12

condra wrote:

I was gonna ask but didn't want to go off topic. Thanks though, I'll get in touch with them during the week. If they ask for more money, I'm guessing I can claim some of that as expenses too.

Yes & it won't be a lot more I wouldn't think.

Claiming travel expenses is usually an agreed rate per mile with revenue. This would include insurance and wear & tear on the vehicle, servicing, fuel etc

hold my beer

I moved to FBD from no-nonsense a few years ago and they tried to shaft me with no business use. I told them I have always had a policy that allows business use, as I need to use my car driving to and from places I'm working. They eventually changed it for me. They also had to change my address at the same time and because of the address change, my policy went down.

mickdw

I believe you cannot claim motor expenses at all without at least class 1 business use.
Yes you can claim the same portion of insurance cost as you.do fuel etc.
I put everything car related in - all fuel, insurance, tax, maintenance etc. Then claim the business percentage.