Can a Company Pay for Employees' EV Charging? The UK Tax Rules

Yes. A business can give its staff free EV charging at work without creating a tax bill for them, provided it is offered to employees generally. What changes the answer is where the charging happens, whose car it is, and whether the business charges for it. This article sets out the rules that decide it and what free charging actually costs an employer — which is where on-site solar comes in.

Free charging at work: the exemption

Section 237A of the Income Tax (Earnings and Pensions) Act 2003, inserted by the Finance Act 2019, says no income tax arises where an employer provides facilities for charging an electric vehicle's battery at or near an employee's workplace, as long as the facilities are made available generally to the employer's employees at that workplace. "Facilities" includes the electricity itself but not workplace parking, and the section covers vehicles that are not the employer's taxable cars or vans — in practice, employees' own cars.

Two practical conditions follow. The charging must be at or near the workplace, not at the employee's home. And it must be open to staff generally, not reserved for directors or a chosen few; a booking rota that everyone can use is consistent with that, a single named bay for the managing director is not.

Company cars

For company cars the position is also favourable. HMRC's Employment Income Manual (EIM23900) explains that electricity is not "fuel" for the car fuel benefit charge, so charging a company car at work does not create a fuel benefit. The company car's own benefit-in-kind charge is a separate matter set by the car's list price and emissions band.

Home charging and mileage claims

• Charging at an employee's home is treated differently from workplace charging and can be taxable depending on who owns the car and what the employer pays for; EIM23900 sets out the cases, and this is the area to take advice on.
• Employees driving their own EV on business can be paid the approved mileage allowance rates that apply to any car, tax-free up to the approved amounts.
• Company EVs used on business can be reimbursed for the electricity at HMRC's advisory electricity rate, which HMRC reviews and publishes regularly.

What free workplace charging costs the employer

The tax is simple; the cost is the electricity. On the site's grid supply at the average Q1 2026 business price of 24.14p/kWh, an employee who commutes 3,000 miles a year in a car doing 3.4 miles per kWh — the efficiency implied by Zapmap's own pence-per-mile figures — uses about 880 kWh, costing the employer around £213 a year. Ten employees: about £2,130.

If the chargers follow the output of an on-site array, part of that energy comes from panels whose capital cost works out at roughly 5–6p per kWh over their life, or — once they are built — the few pence of export payment given up. That is why staff charging and solar pair well: the chargers soak up the midday surplus that a five-day office would otherwise export, and the benefit to staff costs the business far less than the grid price. It is one of the lines in the EV charging business case, alongside fleet savings and tax relief. The cost calculator for business fleets prices the energy side for your own vehicles.

If you charge staff instead

Some employers recover the cost with a per-kWh tariff through the charger's back-office platform. That is a sale of electricity: the exemption for free charging no longer matters, the price needs setting and publishing, and if the business is VAT-registered it will normally account for VAT on what it charges. The chargers need reliable per-session metering. A modest tariff can cover the grid cost while staying well below the 54p/kWh average for public standard chargers.

The grant and allowances on the chargers

The Workplace Charging Scheme pays up to £500 per socket (75% of cost, 40 sockets, until 31 March 2027). For an ordinary business applicant the grant-funded chargers are for staff and fleet use — which fits staff charging exactly. The rest of the chargepoint cost, after the grant, can qualify for the 100% first-year allowance until 31 March 2027 for companies; the capital allowances guide covers the order of claims.

Summary

• Free charging at or near the workplace, available to employees generally: no income tax for staff (ITEPA 2003 s237A).
• Company cars charged at work: no fuel benefit charge, because electricity is not fuel for that charge (EIM23900).
• Home charging: different rules — take advice.
• Charging a tariff: a sale, with VAT if you are registered.

This article explains published rules as at 27 September 2026 and is not tax advice. Sources: ITEPA 2003 s237A; HMRC EIM23900; DESNZ Quarterly Energy Prices table 3.4.2; Zapmap Price Index (August 2026); GOV.UK Find a Grant — Workplace Charging Scheme.