If you drive a business vehicle and use it in your personal life, the chances are you’ll be racking up the miles and potentially having to spend lots on fuel. This latter point need not necessarily be the case though, there are several ways you can help make this situation more affordable for both you and ultimately your business.
Examples of Usage
To make this situation a little clearer, if you do indeed use your business vehicle for work and leisure you will typically use your car each day for many purposes. This post from Motorpoint for instance details how parents especially will clock up about 1,000 miles a year taxiing children around, then when you add this your trips to and from work (even more if you work around the country) and social visits to friends and family, costs can certainly climb.
How to Save Money
The benefit of a business vehicle though means you shouldn’t have to fork out so much for all these journeys. Here are a few ways to cut costs:
Claiming back on Expenses
Your company should have a system set up for claiming back fuel costs for business travel. Normally this is a flat rate per mile and you need receipts as evidence to make any claims. If in any doubt you should speak with the finance or HR team in your company.
Switching your Vehicle
When you’re choosing a car for your business, don’t just settle on the first option you see. Instead, do a little research and choose something more economical with a high MPG to limit your trips to the petrol pumps.
Getting an Additional Allowance
It might be worth speaking with your workplace about getting an additional allowance to help you with costs – particularly if you have a family or need to drive around the country each week.
Flexible Working Hours
Having the opportunity to work from home, or for flexitime, can mean you either cut down the number of journeys you need to take, or failing that can help you avoid traffic and improve your MPG.
Sharing Lifts
If there are a few people in a similar situation to you at work, why not look at sharing lifts for any commuting or business trip?
While not all these will be viable for you with your business, you should definitely be able to claim back on expenses, as this should be part of the deal for having a car for business use. So, make sure you use some of the above approaches and help bring your costs down.