OT - The Work Van

[DerbyBorn]

A near neighbour is a Postman. He now comes home in the Royal Mail Van and goes off to work in it the next day. He must have to go to the sorting office to pick up the mail.

I am wondering what has changed - at one time employees could not have come home in a Royal Mail Van. Is is a money saving initiative so that the Royal Mail does not need to provide garaging space for some of their vehicles? I don't thnk he uses it for any "social" use so the pnly benefit to hime is presumably a free ride to and from work.

[The Medway Handyman]

Presumably HMRC would want to get their greedy little fingers involved?

[charles]

Until about 3 years ago our village sorting office (for KT24) had one van and the posties used pushbikes. The van was used for those packets that wouldn't conveniently fit in the panniers.

About 2 years ago, a further 6 vans appeared. Our Postie now delivers from a van. It must be an incredibly inefficient way of working; they should have got electric vans, except the sorting office doesn't have enought parking for all the vans, so they couldn't be recharged overnight. When it's cold or wet, it must improve the working conditions, though.

[Fredxxx]

Only if he uses it for private use that isn't just incidental.

Otherwise it's a good tax free perk where he uses the van purely for commuting.

[ARW]

The lads who take work vans home where I work are charged 50ppm for private use.

[Bob Eager]

May be similar to what happened round here. Canterbury and itws two main satellite towns (Whitstable and Herne Bay) each had their own delivery offices. It all worked fine, then then built a shiny new canterbury DO that turned out to be under used.

So now the Whitstable and Herne Bay postmen all drive to Canterbury in their vans, collect a load of post, go back to their respective towns, park the vans and go off on bikes. Then they drive back to Canterbury and do it again - up to 4 times per day. I suspect they keep their vans so that they can get there in the morning before the buses are running.

[Another John]

"Ding!", as they say. It really pisses me off. The privatisation of Royal Mail was the last bastion ... though, of course, the weaselly small-minded, big-bonused, accountant-type managers they had for the last few years were already into "money-saving" (and bonus-generating) schemes. Expect to see a lot more.

For a long while we around here had the pleasure of seeing the Royal Mail delivered in white, rented, vans.

Pah.

J.

[Andy Burns]

Similarly a mate of mine works for BT, previously he had to get to the exchange to pick his van up from the yard, but for several years he now takes a van home, and his work day starts when he hits the road (GPS tracked of course) and his boss is on his case if it's not mobile by 8am.

[Adrian]

Perhaps he doesn't actually have to go to the sorting office? If it's a fairly rural round, he may well have a meet-up point with somebody who brings his round's post from the sorting office, either on the way to his own round or in a circular route to several rural rounds.

[Tim Watts]

I wonder what they do if the employee has no parking at home?

[Mr Pounder]

[Mr Pounder]

I had a works van for over 13 years. Like everybody else on the company I took it home. I was mobile long before 8am, sometimes 3am. GPS tracked. I got no thanks for this. The rule was not to use the van for private use, or so I heard. I never used it privately and was not told of this rule. Some of the 8am kick off wankers of course tried it on. Taking the van home did lead to more productivity - provided you sorted the van out in your own time which I did. This gave me an easier life whilst working.

[Fredxxx]

Last time I looked at this you were allowed private use within the tax-free perk as long as it was incidental, such as going for lunch etc. But it could not be used for an evening shop. So a shop at lunchtime at the same time as a meal break would probably be ok.

[Mr Pounder]

It got very complicated. At first we/they could do as we/they liked, then we/they could not do as we/they liked. Possibly the boss was getting pissed off with his weekend fuel bills. I never looked into it.

[Andrew Gabriel]

Driving to work is private use as far as HMRC is concerned, so his employer would need to provide a P11D so he can be taxed on the perk. This was the way GEC handled it when I worked there if you drove a company vehicle between office and home. Driving direct to/from clients is fine though - that counts as business use. It might be that he always drives between home and somewhere which isn't his workplace, e.g. to collect/deliver mail, and I suspect that would then not count as private use.

Sadly, not.

[Bill]

In message , Bob Eager writes

Ah yes, Herne Bay. 1958 Kings Hall - Gene Vincent. I was there.

Now back to your regular programming.........

[Robin]

That was right until they changed the company van legislation again - I think in 2005. Employees whose main use of vans is for business travel can now use them for commuting and for other incidental private use without a tax charge.

Unless of course I missed when they changed it back again.

[Fredxxx]

No you're right.

I can't remember the year but the tax on a van used for any personal use including commuting to and from work was on a maximum of £350 or £550 depending on age.

Then that changed and the equivalent benefit with fuel became £3,500. Many tradesmen who were obliged to take their van home because they were on call etc claimed foul, and so the restriction of commuting was removed from the criterion of personal use.

So as long as the vehicle is only used for commuting and incidental personal use, HMRC have guidelines, then there is no tax liability.

[John Miller]

I remember looking into this a few years back when our next door neighbour brought home a large Transit van every night and parked it opposite the guy across the road who parked half on the pavement. Between the two of them they made it very difficult for us to get our car on & off our drive. The police weren't interested, of course. I was exceptionally pissed off that the Government would do something to encourage the parking of large vans in residential areas and also provide free rides to work when the rest of us had to pay through the nose. Thankfully, he moved - the other inconsiderate neighbours are still there and still cause problems parking their 3 cars.

John M

[RJH]

A problem round here too (Sheffield). A lot of side streets are only 3 cars wide. Double parked vans cause a lot of trouble, and we now have half a dozen or so on our street parked overnight of late. All unmarked/local traders though.