Employees working from home can claim tax relief

People working from home can apply for heating, electricity and perhaps broadband expenses.

Thousands of workers who have recently been asked to work from home as a result of the outbreak of Covid-19 can avail of Revenue's e-worker tax relief.

Tax refund specialists at Taxback.com say that many of these employees will never have worked from home before, and so will be unaware of the relief that is available to them.

More than 100,000 people already worked from home before the Covid-19 outbreak and Revenue has made provisions for these people to be reimbursed for work-related expenses.

These include heating, electricity and perhaps broadband expenses.

Taxback.com said that by working from home over the coming weeks, and possibly months, people will incur some additional costs that they may not even be aware of.

Joanna Murphy, CEO of Taxback.com, said that from a tax perspective, an employer can pay €3.20 a day to their employee to cover these additional costs.

Ms Murphy said this payment is tax free, which means they won't be deducting PAYE, PRSI or USC from that amount.

However, employers have no legal obligation to pay the tax relief.

"But even if your employer doesn't and/or isn't in a position to pay the €3.20, these expenses are eligible for tax relief meaning the home-worker can claim tax back on them," Joanna Murphy said.

"Any claims made will need to be supported with evidence in the form of receipts and possibly a letter from your employer stating that you do, in fact, work from home and that they do not reimburse you for these expenses," she added.

Ms Murphy also said the allowance or rebate claimed must be reasonable, allowing for the fact that the utilities are for both personal and work and benefit everyone else in the home, so the refund received will be based on only a portion of the overall expenses.