300,000 remote workers to miss out on working from home tax relief

If you work from home and your employer requires you to, then you currently get tax relief for each week to cover expenses.

But, the government said in the Autumn Budget that this will no longer be available from April 2026 as chancellor Rachel Reeves looks to tighten her purse strings in a bid to reduce the country’s debt.

The move is expected to raise £100 million for Labour by 2030/31, but for thousands of home workers, this leaves them worse off, especially if they have no option but to work from home.

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Since Covid in 2020, many businesses decided to make the working from home arrangement permanent and have put down the shutters to their offices for good.

How much is the working from home tax relief worth?

Currently, if you are required to work from home and have no choice, then you are able to claim relief on £6 a week.

For basic rate taxpayers, this is worth £62.40 a year, while higher rate taxpayers get £124.80 and additional rate taxpayers receive £140.40.

The working from home tax relief will be abolished in April 2026, as confirmed in Budget documents. The rule change won't affect employees whose working costs are reimbursed by their bosses.

The cut comes after the government said a large proportion of workers putting in claims for the tax relief were ineligible.

David Stirling, financial adviser at Belfast-based financial advisory firm Mint Wealth, said, in any case, the removal of the tax relief was a “further slap in the face” for workers.

“Remote workers, consider yourselves quietly squeezed by the chancellor,” he said.

How to claim working from home tax relief

If you work from home by no choice of your own, then make sure you do not miss out on this year’s relief while it is still available.

You are eligible for working from home tax relief if you have to work from home if your job requires you to live far away from your office or your employer doesn’t have an office.

You cannot claim if your employment contract lets you work from home some or all of the time or your employer has an office but you can’t get there because there occasionally isn’t enough space.

Claims can only be put in for things to do with your work as well, such as business phone calls or gas and electricity bills for your work area. You can’t claim relief on rental or broadband costs.

You can backdate claims for the relief by up to four years, so it’s worth checking if you’re eligible if you haven’t already as you could be due quite the windfall.

If you normally complete a self-assessment tax return, say if you are self-employed, you have to claim the relief through your tax return. Otherwise you can claim via gov.uk.

Workers forced back to the office?

Working from home was a necessity for millions during the coronavirus pandemic, but a number of major employers have dialled back on flexible working arrangements since.

Amazon’s boss Andy Jassy ordered a return to pre-Covid working conditions in a letter to staff last September while Asda announced plans to cut hybrid working at the end of 2024.

However, plenty of workers are rejecting being ordered back into the office. Less than half of UK workers would return to the office full-time if told to, according research by Kings College London.

The university also found ‘no evidence’ of a mass move back into offices, with working from home rates remaining stable since 2022.

Meanwhile, the government’s working from home committee recently highlighted the benefits of working from home arrangements for people with disabilities, parents and carers.