Every expense a UK limited company can claim, with the HMRC reference for each one.
What a limited company can actually claim
Most directors claim a fraction of what they could, and a few claim things that quietly create a personal tax bill. This is the full list rather than the popular bits, with the trap written next to anything that has one.
Test one, for the company
Is the cost wholly and exclusively for the business? If so it comes off profit, and profit is taxed at 19% up to £50,000 and 25% above £250,000. Every £100 claimed keeps £19 to £25 in the company.
Test two, for you
Does the company paying for it count as pay in your hands? Most of this list is clean. Where it is not, the line says so. Getting this second test wrong is what turns a saving into a personal tax bill.
130 lines: 120 that apply to any UK limited company, plus 10 for specific trades. Every one links to its HMRC source. Rates are 2026/27, checked 11 August 2026.
Home and workspace
Working from home, flat rate
The company pays you £6 a week, £26 a month or £312 a year towards household costs. No receipts and no questions asked.
Catch: From 6 April 2026 you can no longer claim this yourself on a tax return, so it has to come from the company.The homeworking relief that ended
Employees used to claim homeworking costs personally where the employer did not pay them. That relief was removed from 6 April 2026.
Catch: The employer reimbursement route above is untouched. If you were claiming it personally, move it into the company.Working from home, actual cost
More than £6 a week is allowed where you can evidence the extra gas, electricity and metered water the work actually causes.
Catch: Rent, mortgage interest and council tax do not count. They do not go up because you work at home.Renting a room to your company
A written licence at a market rent, which the company deducts in full.
Catch: The rent is income on your own tax return, so you only gain the margin above your real costs, and it needs a genuine agreement.Office or studio
Rent, business rates, service charge, buildings insurance and utilities on any space the company rents.
Coworking and hot desks
Monthly memberships and day passes.
Room and venue hire
Any space rented to work or meet in, by the hour, the day or the term.
Storage
Off-site storage for stock, equipment and records.
Phone, internet and software
Mobile phone
Put the contract in the company name and the entire bill is claimable with no tax on you, personal calls included.
Catch: One phone per person, and it must be the company's own contract. Reimbursing your personal contract does not work.Home landline
Itemised business calls only. Line rental is not claimable.
Broadband
Claimable only where you had no connection and put one in because the work needed it.
Catch: If you already had broadband, working from home costs you nothing extra, so there is nothing to claim and reimbursing it is taxable pay. This is the most commonly overclaimed item on the list.Business software and SaaS
Google Workspace or Microsoft 365, cloud storage, password manager, antivirus, VPN, note taking, design tools, AI subscriptions.
Accounting and bookkeeping software
Xero, FreeAgent, receipt capture and expense tools.
Booking, scheduling and payments
Calendly, Acuity, your booking system and payment links.
Video and collaboration tools
Zoom, Google Meet, Slack, project management and shared whiteboards.
Website
Domain, hosting, builder subscription, design, copywriting, search optimisation and ongoing maintenance.
Stationery, print and postage
Paper, printer ink, folders, pens, postage and couriers.
Refreshments for the workspace
Tea, coffee, milk and water, in reasonable amounts. Free or subsidised meals on the premises available to all staff are exempt.
Online teaching platforms Tutoring and teaching
The platforms you actually teach on, interactive whiteboards and lesson delivery tools.
Books, past papers and exam board materials Tutoring and teaching
Textbooks, revision guides, past papers, specifications, subject journals and resource site subscriptions.
Equipment and one-off purchases
Computers and devices
Laptop, desktop, monitor, tablet, phone handset. The full cost comes off in the year you buy it.
How the full deduction works
The Annual Investment Allowance gives 100% of the cost in year one, up to £1m a year. Almost everything a small company buys sits inside it.
Second hand equipment
Qualifies for the Annual Investment Allowance, so you still get the full deduction.
Equipment kept at home
No tax charge on you where the company provides it for work and private use is not significant.
Leasing and hire purchase
Monthly payments on leased or financed equipment.
Repairs and replacements
Fixing or replacing equipment.
Catch: An upgrade that genuinely improves the asset is capital, not a repair, so it is treated differently.Software bought outright
Treated as equipment and covered by the same allowance.
Anything above the allowance
Goes into the writing down pool, now 14% a year from April 2026, reduced from 18%.
First year allowances
A 40% first year allowance from 1 January 2026 covers assets that fall outside full expensing and the Annual Investment Allowance.
Teaching hardware Tutoring and teaching
Webcam, microphone, headset, graphics tablet and stylus, ring light, second screen and document camera.
Travel
Your own car
55p a mile for the first 10,000 business miles, then 25p.
Catch: The rate rose from 45p on 6 April 2026, the first rise in 15 years, and it is backdated to the start of the tax year, so anything already paid at 45p can be topped up.Motorcycle and bicycle
24p a mile on a motorcycle and 20p on a bicycle.
Carrying a colleague
An extra 5p a mile for each passenger who is also an employee on the same business trip.
What counts as business travel
Journeys to a temporary workplace, to clients, and between workplaces.
Catch: Getting to a place you work at regularly is commuting and is never claimable. A site stops being temporary once you expect to be there beyond 24 months.Public transport
Trains, buses, coaches, flights and taxis on business journeys.
Parking, tolls and charges
Including the congestion charge on a business trip.
Catch: Parking fines and penalties are never allowable, wherever you got them.Meals while travelling
Actual cost, or flat rates of £5 over 5 hours away, £10 over 10 hours and £25 over 15 hours, plus £10 more if you are still travelling after 8pm.
Overnight incidentals
£5 a night in the UK and £10 abroad, for personal odds and ends while away.
Catch: A penny over and the whole payment becomes taxable, not just the excess.Overseas travel
Business trips abroad, visas and travel insurance. HMRC publishes country by country scale rates for meals and accommodation.
Late working taxis
Up to 60 journeys home a year where you work past 9pm and public transport has stopped or is unreasonable.
Parking at work
Free or paid parking at or near the workplace is tax free, for cars, motorcycles and bicycles.
Vehicles through the company
Electric car
100% of the cost deducted in year one on a new zero emission car, available until 31 March 2027.
First year allowances for zero emission cars and chargepoints
What an electric car costs you personally
The benefit charge is 4% of list price in 2026/27, against 25% or more for an equivalent petrol car.
Charge points
100% of the cost of installing a chargepoint, also until 31 March 2027.
First year allowances for zero emission cars and chargepoints
Charging at work
Free electricity for a company car at the workplace is tax free. Electricity is not fuel, so no fuel benefit charge arises.
Reimbursing electricity
7p a mile for charging at home and 15p using public chargers.
Petrol and diesel cars
Rarely worth putting through the company. The write off is slow and the benefit charge is heavy. Mileage on your own car usually beats it.
Vans
A flat benefit charge rather than a share of list price, and no charge at all where private use is only the commute.
Bicycles and cycle to work
A company bike mainly used for commuting is tax free on you and deductible for the company.
Paying yourself and other people
Your salary
Deductible in full, and it keeps your state pension record intact.
Employer National Insurance
15% on pay above £5,000 a year, and it is deductible too.
Employment Allowance
£10,500 off the employer National Insurance bill.
Catch: Not available while you are a director and the only employee paid above the secondary threshold. Taking on one other person on a real salary unlocks it.Employing your partner or family
Entirely fine, at a commercial rate, for work actually done and actually paid.
Catch: HMRC challenges salaries that do not match the work performed.Subcontractors and freelancers
Fees to self employed people who deliver work for you.
Assistants and admin support
Wages, or fees to a virtual assistant or bookkeeper.
Other tutors you pay Tutoring and teaching
Fees to self employed tutors who deliver lessons for you.
Pensions and protection
Company pension contributions
The company pays straight into your pension. No income tax, no National Insurance, and it reduces corporation tax. Up to £60,000 a year, plus unused allowance carried forward from the last three years. The most efficient way to get money out of a company.
Catch: The allowance tapers once threshold income passes £200,000 and adjusted income passes £260,000.Pensions advice
Up to £500 a year per employee for regulated pensions advice, tax free.
Relevant Life cover
Company paid life insurance on you. Deductible, no benefit charge, and the payout is tax free to your family and sits outside your estate.
Executive income protection
Company paid cover replacing your income if you cannot work.
Private medical insurance
Deductible for the company.
Catch: It is a taxable benefit on you, so weigh the corporation tax saving against the personal tax cost.Employers liability insurance
Legally required as soon as you have staff.
Tax free benefits people miss
Annual party
£150 a head a year including guests, fully deductible and tax free. It has to be a genuinely annual event and open to everyone employed.
Catch: It is a cliff edge, not an allowance. £151 makes the whole amount taxable. The £150 also has to cover every annual event, so a summer party and a Christmas one share it.How the party limit is worked out
Divide the total cost by everyone who attends, including non-employee guests. With two events, the one that best uses the £150 stays exempt.
Catch: A one-off celebration, such as a 25th anniversary, is not an annual function and does not qualify at all.Trivial benefits
£50 a time, as often as you like, for gifts and small treats. No tax and no reporting.
Catch: Capped at £300 a year for a director of a close company, never cash or a cash voucher, and never a reward for work done.Health screening and medical check ups
One health assessment and one medical check up a year, tax free.
Eye tests and glasses
An eye test required for screen work, and corrective glasses where the test shows you need them solely for screen use.
Catch: Everyday glasses are a taxable benefit even if the prescription includes a screen element.Interest free loans
Up to £10,000 outstanding at any point in the tax year, with no tax charge.
Long service awards
£50 for each year of service, once an employee passes 20 years.
Suggestion scheme awards
Up to £5,000 for an idea that saves the business money, and £25 encouragement awards.
Welfare counselling
Tax free where it is made available to all employees.
Sports and recreation facilities
Tax free where generally available to staff.
Relocation
Up to £8,000 of qualifying moving costs where a job move requires it.
Workplace nursery
Tax free childcare where the company is genuinely involved in running and financing the provision.
Catch: Childcare vouchers closed to new entrants in October 2018, so the nursery route is what remains.Gifts and awards from other people
Up to £250 a year from someone who is not your employer.
Medical treatment abroad
The cost of necessary treatment where you fall ill while working outside the UK.
Equipment for disabled employees
Equipment or services provided so someone can take up or stay in work.
Training and professional standing
Training and CPD
Far more generous through a company than most people assume. Work related training is tax free and deductible, and that includes the course fee, the materials, and the travel and meals to get there.
What counts as work related
Training for your current duties or duties you are likely to take on. Internal and external courses both qualify, with no territorial limit.
Catch: Training that is really a reward or an inducement rather than genuine development does not qualify.Conferences and events
Attendance, travel and accommodation, in the UK or abroad.
Professional memberships
Bodies on HMRC approved List 3 are tax free. Others are deductible where directly relevant to the trade.
Checking a professional body
HMRC publishes the full approved list. If your body is on it, the subscription is clean.
Exam and registration fees
Where the work requires them.
Journals, books and trade press
Subscriptions and reference material relevant to the trade.
Retraining someone who is leaving
Courses of up to two years for an employee leaving the business.
DBS checks Tutoring and teaching
Your check, every renewal and the DBS update service subscription.
Safeguarding and first aid Tutoring and teaching
Certification and the refreshers that keep it current.
Subject and teaching associations Tutoring and teaching
Subject associations and teaching bodies, tax free where they appear on HMRC List 3.
Insurance, fees and finance
Professional indemnity
Fully deductible and very often forgotten.
Public liability
Particularly where you work on site or hire a venue.
Cyber insurance
Worth having wherever you hold client data.
Directors cover and indemnity insurance
Directors and officers insurance, and employee liabilities and indemnity cover, which has its own exemption.
Expenses and benefits: employee liabilities and indemnity insurance
Accountancy and bookkeeping
Accountancy fees and bookkeeping support.
Catch: The slice covering your personal tax return is technically a benefit on you rather than a company cost.Legal fees
Contracts, terms of business, employment advice and chasing unpaid invoices.
Catch: Fees on buying property or shares are capital and are not deductible.Bank charges
Account fees, transfer charges and foreign exchange costs.
Card and payment processing fees
Stripe, PayPal, GoCardless and platform payment charges. Routinely missed, and often the largest of these.
Interest on business borrowing
Business loans, overdrafts and the company credit card.
Companies House fees
The confirmation statement and other statutory filing fees.
Bad debts
An invoice a customer never pays, once you have written it off in the accounts.
Pre-trading costs
Anything bought to get going, reaching back 7 years before you started trading, treated as incurred on day one.
Charitable donations
Qualifying donations are taken off profits before corporation tax is worked out.
Sponsorship
Deductible where it is genuinely advertising.
Catch: HMRC looks hard at sponsorship of something the director personally enjoys, such as a family member team.What a claim is actually worth
Profits under £50,000 are taxed at 19% and over £250,000 at 25%, so every £100 claimed keeps £19 to £25 in the company.
The band in between
Between £50,000 and £250,000 marginal relief applies, and the effective rate on that slice is 26.5%. Claims are worth most here.
Watch the VAT threshold Tutoring and teaching
Registration is triggered by rolling 12 month turnover passing £90,000, not by your accounting year.
Marketing and clients
Platform and directory commission
Fees and commission charged by the marketplaces that send you work.
Networking
Business group membership and event fees.
Branded clothing and uniform
Allowable only with a permanent, conspicuous logo, along with genuine protective clothing.
Catch: Plain clothes never qualify, however strict the dress code and however much you only wear them for work.Gifts to clients
Up to £50 per recipient a year, and the gift itself must carry a conspicuous advert for the business.
Catch: Food, drink, tobacco and vouchers never qualify however small, and going a pound over £50 disallows the whole gift, not just the excess.Tutoring platform commission Tutoring and teaching
Commission taken by Tutorful, Superprof, MyTutor and similar marketplaces.
What you cannot claim
Client entertaining
Meals, drinks and hospitality for clients and prospects. Never deductible, for any business, at any level.
Catch: Staff entertaining is different and is deductible, though outside the £150 annual event it is taxable on the employee.Everyday clothing
Not deductible even if bought purely for work and never worn otherwise.
Commuting
Travel to a place you work at regularly is private travel, not business travel.
Fines and penalties
Parking tickets, speeding fines and regulatory penalties are all disallowed.
Interest and penalties on tax
What HMRC charges you for paying late is not a deductible cost.
Broadband you already had
No additional cost means nothing to claim, and reimbursing it is taxable pay.
Dividends and drawings
Not expenses at all. Only salary run through payroll reduces company profit.
Depreciation
Added back in the tax computation. Capital allowances replace it.
The private share of anything
Where something is used partly privately, only the business share is claimable.
The private tuition VAT trap Tutoring and teaching
Private tuition is VAT exempt only when an individual teaches independently. A limited company cannot use that exemption, so once turnover passes £90,000 the company must register and charge VAT on lessons.
Catch: The upside is that registering lets the company reclaim VAT on most of the costs on this page. Plan for it well before you reach the threshold.Nothing matches that search. Try a shorter word.
Frequently asked questions
What expenses can a UK limited company claim?
Any cost incurred wholly and exclusively for the purposes of the trade reduces the company's taxable profit. That covers premises, equipment, travel, software, insurance, professional fees, salaries and pension contributions. A limited company also has a second question to answer that a sole trader does not: whether the company paying for something counts as taxable pay in the director's hands.
What is the mileage rate for 2026-27?
55p per mile for the first 10,000 business miles and 25p thereafter. The rate rose from 45p on 6 April 2026, the first increase in 15 years, and applies to the whole of the 2026-27 tax year.
Can a director claim home broadband as a company expense?
Usually not. HMRC's position is that where a director already pays for broadband at home, working from home creates no additional expense, so there is nothing for the company to reimburse tax free. Only a connection installed specifically because there was none qualifies. This is the most commonly overclaimed item.
How much can a company spend on a Christmas party?
£150 per head per tax year, including guests, is exempt from tax. It must be an annual event and open to all employees. It is a cliff edge rather than an allowance: at £151 per head the whole amount becomes taxable, not just the excess, and the £150 has to cover every annual function in the year combined.
Claiming everything on this list is the easy half. Knowing which of them your company should actually be doing, and in what order, is the other half.
Book a callThe working
The two tests, and why a company is different
A sole trader asks one question of every cost: was it incurred wholly and exclusively for the trade? A limited company has to answer two, and the second one is where most of the money is lost.
| Question | Who it is about | What goes wrong |
|---|---|---|
| Is it wholly and exclusively for the business? | The company | Under-claiming. Costs that qualify never get put through. |
| Does the company paying for it count as your pay? | You, personally | Over-claiming. A benefit in kind arises and the saving reverses. |
Almost every expensive mistake we see is a sole trader rule applied to a company. Apportioning household bills, splitting the broadband, treating training as "a new skill so it does not count" - all of those are the wrong test for a director, and two of the three cost you money in the wrong direction.
The three that cost people the most
Broadband. The single most overclaimed item on the list. HMRC's position is that if you already pay for broadband at home, working from home creates no additional expense. There is nothing to reimburse, and reimbursing it anyway is taxable pay. Only a connection put in because there genuinely was none qualifies.
The annual party. £150 a head is a cliff edge, not an allowance. Spend £151 and the entire amount becomes taxable, not the £1 over. It also has to cover every annual event in the year combined, so a summer party and a Christmas one share the same £150.
Gifts to clients. Same cliff edge at £50 per recipient per year, and the gift has to carry a conspicuous advert for the business. Food, drink, tobacco and vouchers are excluded outright, however small. A £30 bottle of wine with your logo on it is not deductible; a £30 diary with your logo on it is.
What changed for 2026/27
Three changes matter enough to revisit what you are already claiming.
| What | Was | Now |
|---|---|---|
| Mileage, first 10,000 miles | 45p | 55p from 6 April 2026 |
| Employee claim for homeworking | Available | Removed from 6 April 2026 |
| Main rate writing down allowance | 18% | 14% from April 2026 |
The mileage rise is the first in 15 years and is backdated to the start of the tax year, so anything already paid at 45p can be topped up to 55p without tax or National Insurance arising.
The homeworking change only removes the employee's own claim. A company paying its director £6 a week is unaffected, which for most one-person companies means moving the claim rather than losing it.
How this list is sourced
Working from memory produces a long list with holes you cannot see. This one is built by walking HMRC's own two enumerations end to end: the Expenses and benefits A to Z, which covers what an employer can provide, and booklet 480 chapter 5, which lists every payment and benefit that is not taxable.
Every line carries a link to the HMRC page it comes from, and every one of those links is machine checked before the page is published. A reference that has gone dead fails the build rather than sitting there quietly.
What this page cannot do is tell you which of these your company should be doing, or in what order. Several of them interact: the pension contribution, the salary level and the Employment Allowance are one decision, not three.