Trivial benefits: staff gifts.
Trivial benefits: tax-free staff gifts under £50 in the UK.
UK employers can give staff small gifts free of tax and National Insurance under HMRC’s trivial benefits rule. Here’s how it works, and how to spend it on something your staff will use, at a small local business.
Guide · Updated
The rule
Under HMRC’s trivial benefits rules, a gift to an employee is free of tax and National Insurance, and doesn’t need reporting, if:
- it costs £50 or less
- it isn’t cash or a cash voucher
- it isn’t a reward for their work or performance
- it isn’t in their contract, and isn’t a salary sacrifice
The £50 is per gift. A gift that costs £51 is taxable in full, not just the extra pound. There is no yearly limit for most staff, but directors of close companies can get no more than £300 of trivial benefits in a tax year. Check HMRC’s page, or ask your accountant, before you buy.
Does a sauna voucher count?
A voucher for sauna sessions is a non-cash voucher: it can only be spent on a service, not swapped for money. So a sauna voucher worth up to £50, given as a gift rather than a reward, can be a trivial benefit, the same way a shop voucher can.
Ideas
- A Christmas sauna voucher for a sauna near each person’s home.
- A birthday or work anniversary gift of a session for two.
- A wellbeing week gift, for Mental Health Awareness Week in May.
- A team sauna for a whole team. A team event is usually treated as staff entertainment rather than a trivial benefit; ask your accountant.
Why local
Most staff gift budgets go to a chain or a gift card company. A voucher for an independent sauna in your staff’s own town pays a small local business instead, and gives people an hour away from a screen. That is easy to explain in a staff email or a wellbeing report.
Sauna vouchers through Olladay
Olladay is booking software for independent saunas in the UK and Ireland. Tell us where your staff are and we’ll reply with the saunas near them, what they offer and the prices. You can buy vouchers from the sauna itself, with an invoice in its name, or an Olladay wellness card for each person from us, on one invoice, to use at any of our saunas that take it.
Questions
Is a gift voucher a trivial benefit?
A non-cash voucher that costs £50 or less, isn’t a reward for work and isn’t in the contract can be. A cash voucher, or one that can be exchanged for cash, can’t.
How many trivial benefits can an employee get?
There’s no yearly limit for most employees, as long as each gift meets the rules. Directors of close companies are limited to £300 a tax year.
What if the gift costs more than £50?
Then the whole gift is a taxable benefit, not just the amount over £50.
Do trivial benefits need reporting to HMRC?
No. Gifts that meet the trivial benefits rules don’t go on a P11D or through payroll.