Recording new mileage - Universal

1 Find the screen

If you're a sole trader, and you have no staff, start by selecting the Expenses tab from the Overview screen.

If you're a sole trader with staff, a limited company director, or a partner in a partnership, choose 'Expenses' from the 'My Money' menu.

Alternatively, you can access the Expenses area quickly by selecting 'New Mileage' from the Quick Links menu on the Overview screen.

2 Choose the user

Once you're in the Expenses area, make sure you've selected the appropriate user (i.e. the person who spent the money) from the 'Show' drop-down menu.

3 New Mileage

Select 'Add New Mileage'.

This brings up the Create New Mileage screen.

Date and distance

Enter the date you made the journey.

Put in how far you travelled, remembering that you may need to double the mileage for a return journey to record that you went out and back.

Reason for the journey

Put a description of why this journey was undertaken. Make sure it's clearly identifiable whether this journey is allowable or not for tax. For example, if it's ordinary home-to-work commuting then this is not allowable for tax, so make this clear in the description.

Type of vehicle

From the 'vehicle type' drop-down menu, choose the kind of vehicle you made this journey in: car (including van), motorcycle or bicycle. Please note that owners of sole trades and partners in partnerships cannot claim bicycle mileage.

As you change the vehicle type, the HMRC approved mileage rate changes according to the kind of vehicle that was used.

Reclaiming VAT on fuel

You need to be registered for VAT and have a VAT receipt for fuel enough to cover the mileage travelled on this journey if you want to reclaim VAT on the fuel. You can't reclaim VAT on the full cost of the mileage travelled, only on the fuel element. So if you do have a VAT receipt, choose that you want to claim for this mileage, and enter the fuel type of your vehicle and the capacity of its engine. FreeAgent will work out the correct VAT reclaim for you.

Re-billing

You can re-bill this mileage to a customer if it was incurred while working on a particular project. Choose which project you want to re-bill it to, and set the rate at which you're going to charge it to the customer. If you haven't yet set up the project, finish entering the mileage and save it, then set up the project. You can always edit the mileage later and re-bill it, so long as it hasn't been paid for from the company in the meantime.

Setting up a recurring claim

If you know you will be taking this journey again, use the options under Recurring to enter the second and future journeys into FreeAgent now.

Attachment

You may also want to upload an attachment, for example a scanned copy of a fuel receipt, particularly if you are claiming VAT on the fuel element.

Once you've finished entering the mileage, complete the process by selecting either:

• "Create New Expense" to save the journey
• "Create and Add Another" to save the journey and start entering another one
• "Cancel" to close the screen without saving the journey

Once you’ve done this, you’ll be able to see the mileage in the list of costs incurred by this user .

Recording mileage rates for a company car

The mileage rate programmed into FreeAgent is for business travel in private cars only, but you could create additional mileage rates. An example of this would be a rate for a company car.

To do this, work out your mileage manually and enter it by using the "New Expense" button instead of using the "New Mileage" button.

You might also want to add a new category to track these expenses. In the example of a company car the category name could be "Company car mileage". You won’t be able to name the category "Mileage", as FreeAgent uses this automatically for business mileage in private cars.