Car Allowance help

[wolfdog59]

New to the forum and really need some help. I am about to talk to my boss about my car allowance and need some advice.

I have been with my company for 3years and had 35000 miles on my car when I started. Now today I have 112K miles on my car. About 85% of the miles are work related. I currently get $350/mnth for an allowance and feel I am getting screwed. The mileage rate is $.46/mil for employees who do not recieve an allowance.

I realize the ecomony is in the state its in, but feel it can't hurt to ask. With the rise in gas prices, car depretiation and etc I think the $350 is extremely low. Any adivce and opinions are greatly appreciated..thank ya'll.

[Daylily]

Are you claiming mileage on your tax return? My husband was in a similar situation once wherein the allowance didn't really match the standard mileage rate. He was able to deduct the difference between the total of the standard mileage rate and the allowance.

[red92s]

112k-35k = 77k over 3 years
77k/36 months = 2,138 miles per month
2,138 miles * 85% work use = 1,818 work related miles per month
1,818 miles * $.46 = $836

so yeah, the back-of-the-envelope numbers seem to indicate that you'd be better off on a per-mile rate. Getting an employer to agree to an $830 a month car allowance seems like a stretch . . . they would be better off just giving you a company-paid car at that point.

[boosami]

Is this your personal car, or a company car? The math works out assuming a company car:

Work miles per month = 1,800
Assumed MPG of car = 18
Gallons of gas needed = 100
Assumed price of gas = $2.60
Total monthly gas cost = $260

With a company car you are pocketing $90 a month with the amount you drive.

Typically, companies will do per-mile reimbursement for employees who do not drive enough to warrant a company car. Part of that is supposed to cover the expense of adding miles to a personal vehicle. Employees that drive a company car may get a monthly allowance, or be rembursed at a mileage rate (if they are lucky!).

If it's a personal car (and it sounds like it is), $90 a month is not much money to make up for all those miles you are putting on your vehicle. If I was using my personal vehicle to drive ~20k+ miles a year for work, I would damn sure ask for a company car.

[simpletron]

I think your over estimating how much is work related. 15% of 77K miles is 11550 miles in 3 years or 3850 miles per year for personal use, so unless your car is about 9 years old at the start(12 now), I doubt you're using only 4K per year. your commute to and from work doesn't count as work related, or detour for lunch, the detoured miles don't count. you'll be suprise at how much isn't directly work related.

the best way to confront your boss is to bring proof it is not enough to cover the work-related cost. you should create travel log, where you keep track of the date, where you started from and went, purpose of visit, odemeter start and end, and total miles. do this for a month and if this mileage cost is more than what they are giving then ask for more. if they don't give you more then you just created the proof for the mileage deduction on your tax return.(multiply by 12 to get yearly)