Two fixes to how mileage is counted
Some clients added their own home as a work site. Others visit several sites in one day but were counted as driving home after each one. Both are now handled in the client portal and in the signed audit report. This page walks through each case with test clients on the live site.
A client adds their home as a work site
A client working from home picked their own address as a "work site" and typed the real place into the name box. Every journey was then from home to home. HMRC does not treat that as travel, and the portal showed the client a server error when they pressed "Looks right — continue". Now the portal checks the address when it is added. If it is the client's home, or within about 0.1 km of it by road, the place is not saved and the client is asked one question.
- The same check applies to an office or depot, and to the AI bookkeeper when it adds a site from the client's answers.
- Any home-to-home trip saved before this change now counts as 0 miles instead of failing.
A client visits more than one place in a day
A regional manager or a community care worker often drives from home to one site, then to the next, and then home. Until now every visit was counted as a separate trip from home and back, which overstated the miles. The portal now spots the days where a client went to more than one place, and asks once how they travelled on those days.
- "From one place straight to the next, then home": each such day becomes one route, in the shortest order. Clients rarely remember their order, and the shortest route is the safer figure to put to HMRC.
- "Home in between each place": each visit stays a trip from home and back, as before.
- Clients without such days never see the question, and nothing changes for them.
The client's summary shows each route
The test client goes to Tesco Silverburn every weekday, to East Kilbride on Mondays and Wednesdays, and to Glasgow Central on Tuesdays and Thursdays. After they answered "straight to the next", their summary lists the two routes they drive, with the days and miles for each.
The audit report explains the routes to HMRC
The signed audit report has a new "Days with more than one place" table under the mileage cover sheet. Each place is charged the miles to reach it, and the last place also carries the drive home, so the places add up exactly to the routes. The mileage claim and the subsistence below it use the same figures.
The difference for the test client
Same journeys, counted the old way and the new way. Subsistence was estimated at £8 a day, bought on half of travel days.
| Before | After | |
|---|---|---|
| Miles in the year | 6,772.8 | 5,752.8 |
| Mileage relief at 45p | £3,047.76 | £2,588.76 |
| Days with a subsistence estimate | 459 | 255 |
| Estimated subsistence | £1,836.00 | £1,020.00 |
Before, a day at two places counted two trips from home and two days of food. Now it counts one route and one day. The claim is lower, but it is what the client drove and spent, which is what HMRC checks.