One of the main attractions for professional contractors to use an Umbrella Company like ‘Redego Umbrella’ is the ability to claim Contract related expenses. The HMRC states that all expenses claimed must be ‘wholly and exclusively incurred in the performance of the duties of the employment’.  In other words, you can legitimately make an expenses claim for any cost you incur as a result of fulfilling your duties of your current assignment. Typical expenses include: travelling to work (bus, mileage, train and even cycling), food costs, membership fees to professional bodies, training courses (that are relevant to the current contract) and many more. Please contact us for more information if you are unsure whether you can claim for a particular expense.

Expenses help to increase your take home pay by reducing the amount of tax that you pay.  In its simplest form, if you are paid £200 a day and you work 5 days, your invoice total is £1000.  If you then claim £200 in expenses, then you will be taxed on (£1000-£200) £800 rather than £1000. By claiming all of the expenses that you are entitled to, you could see your take-home pay reach upwards of 85% of your invoice total, just for claiming what you are entitled to!

For an illustration of how claiming expenses could increase your take-home pay, why not visit our expenses calculator?

All expenses should be submitted using our on-line portal, however it is important to identify between chargeable and tax deductable expenses, as there is an extra step for submitting chargeable expenses;

• Chargeable expenses are expenses that your client has agreed to reimburse your for in full (this will be pre-agreed with your agency/client along with your rate),
• Tax deductible expenses are expenses that are tax deductible only.

When you submit your Tax deductible  expenses, logon to the online portal and click on the ‘add expense claim’ link.  You will then be directed to a page that shows the different types of expenses that you can claim for.  Find the relevant category, then enter the amount of your claim and the date that it relates to (you may also be asked for other information depending on the category).  Once you submit them you will need to send your original receipts for all your expenses claims within 14 days to:

Redego Umbrella
FREEPOST BS8110
Arcade Chambers
8 Kings Road
Clifton
Bristol
BS8 4AB

To prevent any delay in your expenses being paid, please mark the envelope clearly with your name or username.  We do not accept any responsibility for receipts going missing in the post, therefore we recommend that you photocopy all receipts before posting.

When you submit a claim, you will see an ‘exclamation mark’  symbol next to your claim. This means that your claim has been successfully submitted, but we are still awaiting a receipt. If we decide that a claim is not allowed, or if we have not received a receipt within 14 days, a red ‘cross’   symbol will appear next to your claim. If you feel that your claim should have been allowed, please get in touch with us as we will investigate you claim further. If everything is ok with your claim, you will see a green ‘tick’  symbol next to it. This means that you have nothing to worry about!

Individual tax-deductible expenses that are higher than £100 per claim will not be paid until we have received an original receipt from you.  Tax-deductible expense claims that are for less than £100 per claim will be applied to your next payment; we will then need to receive the receipts within 14 days.  If receipts are not received within 14 days then we will reverse any benefit that you have received from the expenses.

When you submit your chargeable expenses you will need to do all of the above, but you will also need to carry out an extra step to charge your agency/client for the cost of your expenses.  When you select ‘add timesheet’ on the online portal to fill out your timesheet details, you can also add your billable expenses.  In the ‘Chargeable expanses & deductions’ section, click on the ‘click to charge an expense to the agency’ link.  A blank field will then open, so that you can enter the total amount of expenses that you would like to be added to your invoice. Most agencies/clients will also need photocopies of your expense receipts and/or a billable expenses claim form signed by your line manager.  Again both of these can be uploaded directly to the ‘add timesheet’ page, by selecting the add timesheet attachment link, this information will then be sent with your invoice.

For contractors who have used our hand written ‘Redego expenses claim form’ in the past, please note that it is no longer necessary to use this form.  Simply enter the details of your expenses online, and then put your original receipts in an envelope and mark it clearly with your name before posting it to us.

Please contact one of the Redego team if you have any questions about claiming or submitting expenses.