So in the past people commuted on a sub £1k bike but now have to have an expensive e-bike to be able to commute.
Er, yes. If we want more people to commute by bike, and I assume that you do as well, then anything that makes it easier for them to do so is likely to help achieve that goal.
be absolutely fuming if they put a cap on it. I've recently moved companies and this is the first one I've worked at that have offered C2W with a decent (5k) budget. Was planning to finally get an ebike in January following probation sign off when the scheme is opened up to me as an employee
Have spent the past 4 months getting really excited to finally replace my nearly 11 year old specialized enduro with a new orbea wild eeb and biding my time for it, honestly, as someone who voted for labour 18 months ago, they've done nothing that has directly benefitted me or improved my QoL, all I see is taxes going up, CoL going up, economy getting worse, benefits of being a higher earner worse which lets be honest, 50k salary today is what 30k was 10 years ago, morale slowing down, growth down, everything seems way worse than it was under the tories and even they were corrupt to the core, first and last time they got my vote, honestly
Quality rant. I'm not sure whether you're saying you're pissed off with labour in general, and so won't vote fir them again, or that you genuinely think it is wrong for them to remove your access to a deeply discounted high end eeb....
I use it every year to stock up on tyres for my £5K commuter (Tripster) which I bought with my own money (left to me by my ol man). And I use them to ride to work! I'm a tax hero, me.
I did buy a bike on a 40% cut when I was on better money about 15 years ago, one of the old CAAD-Xs that were £1K... Did ride it to work a few times. Remember having a stroppy phone call from our finance dept, warning me that there would be checks that I was riding the bike to work. Lol! How would they do that then??! I sold it to a mate before I'd paid it off and bought the Tripster. Cannondale don't make em anymore, but they do make lovely £8K ebikes, which I have one of (bought 2nd hand, no tax breaks).
Er, that's my Cycle Scheme story.
I don’t think the problem is the cycle to work scheme. It’s the fact that HMRC has been deliberately gutted, so people know that they’ve got little to no chance of getting caught.
I am not actually that bothered about how people commute but evidence should be required that they are actually commuting by bike. Where I work no evidence is required at all.
I am not actually that bothered about how people commute but evidence should be required that they are actually commuting by bike. Where I work no evidence is required at all.
I sort of agree. But what if it costs more to obtain such evidence than it saves? Or if the extra administration puts people off the scheme and so reduces the number of people cycling to work?
Interesting reading - definitely sounds like it needs tweaking, rather than ditching. We've bought, oooo, 7 bikes between us on it in the last 15 years, four of which were/are regularly used for commuting, two occasionally used, one has not (but will be when it snows 🙂 ). Mrs Pondo cycles every day now, of which I am immensely proud as neither of us are... athletes, shall I say. 🙂 Wouldn't be happening if she didn't half a half-decent e-bike (£2.5k).
evidence should be required that they are actually commuting by bike. Where I work no evidence is required at all.
Great, let's introduce another admin burden...
Also, what's to stop someone driving to work, parking around the corner, getting the bike out and rolling into the office?
The point of cycle to work was to encourage people to, you know, cycle. To work.
Nobody needs a 6k bike for that. A quick look on Halfords and 1500 quid will get you anything from a...
A few weeks ago I bought a Benno Boost longtail, after about two years of empty promises from my employer saying they were trying to raise their 1k limit. In the end I got so desperate I just had to stump up and buy it retail without using the scheme. With a few basic accessories and the specific panniers it's set me back nearly £4k and it's been used pretty much every day since and approaching 200km, all on sub 5k hilly journeys.
There are not many cheaper options for a longtail ebike that is built to last with quality kit and considering it is meant to cover stuff like lights, outer clothing and helmets, £4k doesn't really stretch far. Obviously a standard ebike hybrid isn't as versatile for carting stuff back and forth from work or grabbing stuff from the shops on the way home. It's a revelation.
always found it flawed
my work has the 1k limit, and limits where it can be used? halfords?tredz? and can't be used on sale bikes i think?
and then because im not taxed to the nines, the actual benefit is minimal, although the ability to pay back over time might be useful
it shouldn't benefit higher earners more than lower earners, in fact it should be flipped on its head.
I've said it a million times, but a scheme where manufacturers/dealers could submit a model to be verified as a commuter/shopper specific model and if approved it is sold without attracting VAT. E or normal - any value. Sell to anyone who wants to buy it - employed, retired, unemployed. Still doesn't help with the loan/repayment aspect but accessible for all. You it to travel to work, go shopping, visit friends, get some light exercise - all the good stuff you can do with a bike that's intended as tool not a toy or bit of sports equipment.
Yes, the lycra brigade (and I include myself in this) who want to commute on something that's essentially a gravel/road bike miss out (and the cool kids who commute on BMXs) - but they don't need encouragement to switch to doing low distance travel on a bike. It would mean manufacturers would be encouraged to make and promote genuinely urban appropriate utility bikes and ebikes with guards and racks and a lights and proper comfort in normal clothes like a grown up civilised country.
But a scheme that had the loophole of using taxable income from high-rate taxpayers to significantly fund the £5K+ n+1 weekend toys of the well-heeled whilst the minimum wage worker couldn't access a loan to help buy their cheap bike to actually ride to work on is completely indefensible.
Will make the tiniest pimple of a difference in the grand scheme of things mind.
The main issue will be that these sorts of salary sacrifice schemes - not especially C2W - are used widely to reduce gross salaries to avoid some of the tax threshold changes, and to qualify for things like Child Benefit.
I'm not surprised at the idea being floated, but it must be very small beer compared to salary sacrifices for pensions, electric cars etc.
C2W scheme caps are common in any case. Ours (NHS) was only lifted from £1k to £2.5k in 2023. I commute about 2,500 miles per year on my bikes so I have found it useful to buy parts.
am not actually that bothered about how people commute but evidence should be required that they are actually commuting by bike. Where I work no evidence is required at all.
Interesting isn't it, I could provide evidence of my commutes - video footage.. who would check it?? But apart from my health (til I get splatted) and not having to buy petrol, my company gives me no other benefit for not clogging the local roads and car park with another car. A little tax break on some tyres from Tredz every year is the best I can hope for.
May well have been at £1,000 with people actually starting to ride a bike. People buying £6k bikes on it will most likely already be cycling so no health benefit at all. That's what happens when you move massively from the original criteria.
Seeing as you are a very vocal critic of the scheme - can you provide figures showing that this is the case?
Evidence that the original £1K limit has gone, really?
I am not actually that bothered about how people commute but evidence should be required that they are actually commuting by bike
Its get tricky for the valid cycle to the station and then catch the train. Although I guess with BTP new approach to dealing with thefts I guess the test could be requiring you to give the crime reference number and if you dont by the end of the year chances are you werent commuting.
For something that you’re going to use every day and for it to be reliable, you do need to spend a bit of money.
Yet near me there are several warehouses with people commuting each day on BSOs. A cheap bike can be pretty reliable at the expense of weight and general poor performance.
Overall I think as is shown by many of the defenders on this thread it is being used to buy nice shiny toys vs commuting. I would prefer to see the money spent on infrastructure and supporting the poorly paid employees who dont benefit from C2W and yet commute every day on bikes.
On the "evidence of use for commuting" thing, IDGAS. If someone buys a bike to use it in any way, there are sufficient positive health benefits regardless - and some non-cyclists getting the bug increases demand for infrastructure while also converting them from being cycle-haters.
As regards the cost cap, there really is no justification for anything over £2k. The original scheme was well intentioned, let's get it back to that. If some manufacturers are encouraged to improve what's available at that price point then it's also a win. Maybe we'll see more simple XC hardtails...
I've said it a million times, but a scheme where manufacturers/dealers could submit a model to be verified as a commuter/shopper specific model
This is just nonsensical ( if I may make so bold). What constitutes a commuter/shopper?
who want to commute on something that's essentially a gravel/road bike miss out
What's wrong with commuting on a gravel or road bike?
manufacturers would be encouraged to make and promote genuinely urban appropriate urban bikes and ebikes with guards and racks and a lights and proper comfort in normal clothes like a grown up civilised country.
Great. Again, what is this obsession with stipulating that people use a specific tool that can be totally ill suited to the job?
My commute is 18km, the vast majority of which is on fast flat country lanes. WTF would I want an urban bike for that? To keep me regularly cycling on that commute it needs to be fast, light and fun to ride. There has to be a something that draws me to it rather than the car. And some heavy, big tyres, PoS urban monster ain't going to do that.
Don't get me wrong, C2W is a ridiculous system that benefits completely the wrong set of people disproportionately, but specifying some narrow definition of what people can buy is not the fix
I would prefer to see the money spent on infrastructure and supporting the poorly paid employees who dont benefit from C2W and yet commute every day on bikes.
Exactly
Evidence that the original £1K limit has gone, really?
No. That the majority of users are significantly spending more than is necessary. There's been lots of talk of £6k luxury bikes so that should reflect in the average spend? The £1k limit is not fit for use on a 25 year old scheme - that should be patently obvious to anyone, but seeing as you are so vocal, I think it's reasonable that you should be able to tell us what the average spend is on C2W?
Someone asked above the potential tax revenue this will raise. Guardian (and I think FT but can't find link now) quotes "The cost of the scheme rose from £55m in 2019-20 to £130m in 2024-25."> https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/nov/12/rachel-reeves-to-cut-tax-benefits-for-workers-using-salary-sacrifice-schemes-to-buy-bikes <[my reading is this is cost of NI/national income "lost"] Should be noted those bikes still attract VAT and help keep bike shops running. https://www.bikeradar.com/news/cycle-to-work-scheme-delivers-annual-benefits-of-573-million-to-uk-economy says >£500m benefit with £44m VAT alone.
Of course some of us would have bought nice bikes anyway so it's not as simple as saying all that VAT now won't be collected. However, I am not convinced this is entirely about raising revenue.
For the record, the most expensive bike I bought on cyclescheme was a Merida Reacto 2018 (£3k RRP reduced to £2k; and contrary to what some people wrote in the thread, there is no general saying you can't use them on sale bikes- that's down to the scheme providers, employers and retailers) and I did loads of commuting with it when the weather was nice (even if some of that was extending my commute to include Regents Park..) --> fitter, happier, healthier --> more productive and less burden on NHS. Oakies, fine if nobody wants to encourage that for me personally.. I'd be riding anyways.
Prior to that I used cyclescheme for a dedicated hydro disc/105/rack/mudguarded commuter (Pinnacle Arkose 4) in 2015 that racked up a lot of kms and got me off the tube at rush hour. Cost around £1.2k. First "expensive" bike I bought new. Still got it.
Yes, some people abused the scheme. I'd want to see more data to convince me there was widespread abuse though.
TBH, my scheme wasn't all that good in that not too many bike sellers I'd want to use accepted them. I'm more worried about the pension issue if they restrict that. I won't be using the car salary sacrifice as our scheme reduces the employer's pension contribution which can be substantial if the gross vehicle lease is £500 a month - just not worth doing at my time of life considering work pension is 23% on top of my contributions (8-10%).
As regards the cost cap, there really is no justification for anything over £2k.
Ebike + helmet + lights + serious lock.
There are commutes, and commuters, that can be moved away from the car default by including ebikes in the scheme. Set a limit that is designed to stop people buying decent ebikes and it seriously reduces its effectiveness at getting people out of cars and onto bikes.
I think it's reasonable that you should be able to tell us what the average spend is on C2W?
Value of bicycles accessed through the scheme % of Cycle to Work Scheme users
Under £200 8%
£201 to £400 16%
£401 to £600 21%
£601 to £800 9%
£801 to £1,000 21%
£1,001 to £1,200 5%
£1,201 to £1,400 2%
£1,401 to £1,600 6%
£1,601 to £1,800 1%
£1,801 to £2,000 3%
£2,001 and over 6%
Don’t know or can’t remember 1%
From here. Not immediately clear whether that is just from their sample or all users of the scheme.
This is just nonsensical ( if I may make so bold). What constitutes a commuter/shopper?
I don't think it takes much thinking about. I'd happily be the arbiter and write a specification for manufacturers.
I would have:-
- Brakes
- flat bar
- guards
- a method of carrying luggage (beyond strapping a bkepacking frame bag to it - i.e. a pannier rack, built in basket etc).
- Reflectors that are actually attached in at least a semi-permanent way rather than tossed in a bag at the bottom of the box.
As a minimum specification.
They'd might look like this
or this
or even maybe this
What's wrong with commuting on a gravel or road bike?
Nothing wrong with using a gravel bike or road bike -it's what I use - this scheme would just not be for you (or me).
Great. Again, what is this obsession with stipulating that people use a specific tool that can be totally ill suited to the job?
My commute is 18km, the vast majority of which is on fast flat country lanes. WTF would I want an urban bike for that? To keep me regularly cycling on that commute it needs to be fast, light and fun to ride. There has to be a something that draws me to it rather than the car. And some heavy, big tyres, PoS urban monster ain't going to do that.
Your commute would not be fit to lick the boots of mine - 45km each way of very rural roads. You and I would not benefit. Not even a little bit. And you know what - I couldn't give two shits. We are outliers - non normal. We don't need a tax break to get us doing what we do. We'd do it anyway. Hell, for years my employer didn't take part in the scheme....and in no way did that stop me riding in. The fact that a bike suitable for your (or my) needs was not eligible would be met with a tune on the world's smallest violin.
Stop thinking about what works for YOU and start think about what works for US. 'WE' need more people who don't ride bikes for short urban journeys to have a nudge to do it. 'WE' need that because of pollution and congestion in urban areas. 'WE' needed it because as a collective more and more of the NHS' limited budget is begin spent on illnesses brought on by inactivity - don't know about you but I'd rather less of the tax I pay was spend treating type II diabetes and knee replacements brought on by obesity.
C2W by its very definition is a scheme designed to reduce and divert the income tax that could be collected by HMRC. Taxes that could be spent on something else with a health benefit for the population as a whole. Quite simply, you thegeneralist and me, are just not my priority. We miss out - so ****ing what?
Yes, some people abused the scheme. I'd want to see more data to convince me there was widespread abuse though.
"Hands up if you abused the scheme"
STW forumites -
Quality rant. I'm not sure whether you're saying you're pissed off with labour in general, and so won't vote fir them again, or that you genuinely think it is wrong for them to remove your access to a deeply discounted high end eeb....
You know what, I actually typed out a massive reply covering my thoughts on the whole subject, why I feel mugged off by Labour, a full list of what they're actually spaffing tax money on in stupid places, their approach of money grabbing from all tax payers including the 40%, and why I feel I'll absolutely never vote for them ever again. But then I realised what's the point, it will just start an argument on a random cycling internet forum with people who I've never met, have no idea who they really are or their names or faces etc so it would be like arguing into the void and theres probably no point, and will go wildly off topic, so I've redacted it.
But in essence, it's not JUST about getting access to a deeply discounted ebike (deeply discounted could be debatable in terms of implied wording), it's more Labours economic handling, their intent of who foots the bills, and further frustration with tax raids on the middle earners when they're spaffing shit like 110m to ****stan which benefits no UK tax payer at all, or overpaying 9.5bn in benefits due to fraud and system error as a taster examples
Not immediately clear whether that is just from their sample or all users of the scheme.
I read that as being from their sample, which is users who have used the scheme at any time since the start, I think? So, if that's correct, not a true reflection on what's happened since the cap has gone. It's maybe worth remembering that there was always a way to remove the cap if your employer was happy to.
Quite right to cap, but needs to be open to those on the minimum wage.
That requires a much bigger change. When you get into the weeds of nmw legislation you have to pay the name after any salary sacrifice schemes an employee uses include pension contributions. That effectively means that at nmw all salary sacrifice schemes cost the employee nothing. I had to do a big piece of work in a previous job because employees salary sacrifice pensions took them below nmw.
Lets face it, as anyone who's spent any time working in a bike shop (outside of an urban area at least) will be able to verify - the majority of riders using the scheme are buying something for leisure use, I'd estimate 8/10, 9/10. You could legitimately argue though that encouraging the employee to adopt healthier lifestyles still has a net benefit for everyone, in fact the general population could probably do with many more financial incentives to take care of their health, not less.
Yeah, we should be handing those tax breaks to foreign companies to allow them to build cars here for three or four years before relocating to the Far East! Or servers for their AI. Or nuclear power plants. Let the bike industry, what's left of it, fail - there's always Halfords.
See the other thread on that particular topic, but (IMO) there isn't really a "UK Bike industry" anymore as such. There's shops that sell bikes mostly made in the far-east, and a handful of premium frame fabricators who's products cost a lot mainly because they are operating in the UK where labour, material, energy etc are expensive. C2W basically subsidises bicycle retail today, mostly at the higher discretionary price points.
If that's considered acceptable we might as well start letting people do salary sacrifice for other discretionary purchases; fancy a new Telly? or some Golf bats? and want to reduce your tax burden at the same time?
I've said it a million times, but a scheme where manufacturers/dealers could submit a model to be verified as a commuter/shopper specific model and if approved it is sold without attracting VAT.
I actually Quite like that idea, I'd still bolt on the salary sacrifice option to help those in lower income brackets buy those "approved C2W bikes" But yeah it makes sense and makes it harder for people who don't really need a C2W bike abusing the scheme to buy whatever niche toy they fancy...
Perhaps it needs to be re-worked so that it's no longer just 'cycle to work' but addresses and enables the wider green/sustainable travel and health/obesity issues we have in this country.
We need more cyclists! As an aside, I sometimes see a line of about a dozen young children in hi-vis vests cycling in a line between several adults, along our high street. It's really nice to know that in places kids are still doing whatever passes for the Cycling Proficiency Test these days. It'd be lovely if the scheme enabled lower income families to buy a quality bike for the youngsters when they pass.
Yes, some people abused the scheme. I'd want to see more data to convince me there was widespread abuse though.
Without evidence that bike is being used to commute on we will never know. Anecdotally I know quite a few people who used the scheme and only 1 of them rides a bike to work but they are a keen cyclist who also has other bikes...
Lets face it, as anyone who's spent any time working in a bike shop (outside of an urban area at least) will be able to verify - the majority of riders using the scheme are buying something for leisure use, I'd estimate 8/10, 9/10.
The majority of riders using the scheme get the bike, use it once or twice and then put it away, never to be ridden again. The challenge is to get them to take the first step - get a bike. Step two, ride it more often. Step three, commute on it. Let's not mention commuting through the winter yet.
Yea, the scheme is broken.
The tax saving on some of those bikes people on this thread have been talking about getting will be more than the total amount you can claim on JSA (£2393.30).
Give your heads a wobble.
The problem is partly just the name of the scheme, and that the people at the bottom can’t access it. You’d think the goal would be to get as many people as possible using it, since more people cycling would naturally improve both physical and mental health. More people riding bikes the better imo.
I must say, I like Convert's version of the scheme.
Currently commuting on a proper utility bike bought through C2W, (mudguards, rack, dynamo lights, etc. would qualify) but have definitely abused it in the past. 🙋♂️
I've said it a million times, but a scheme where manufacturers/dealers could submit a model to be verified as a commuter/shopper specific model and if approved it is sold without attracting VAT.
Maybe with a sensible (£1k?) limit to keep things simple for people buying bikes from LBSs that typically sell less common brands that might not bother.
But yea, allow brands to submit a list of utilitarian bikes that are specifically for commuting or domestic use and meet some criteria like no suspension, supplied with full racks, guards and panniers (minimum capacity 35kg to avoid some plastic bags being attached to an S-Works Enduro) and exempt them from VAT so that everyone benefits equally.
I think:
Splitting the scheme value between electric assist / not and having different limits for each class has merit. Capping the Ebike limit at £4k would allow a decent (non Surrey Hills weapon) to be purchased. £2k for a non-web is inline with original scheme / inflation.
As a higher rate tax payer, I shouldn't be getting higher rate tax relief on a benefit like this - cap it at the lower rate.
Ah fair enough I suppose.
I've used it 4 times (abused as some might say) all for mid to high end MTBs which almost never got used for actual travel. I'll miss the savings, especially as a higher rate payer. It was pretty easy to 'buy' a nice new bike, run it for 2 years and sell it for not much less than what it cost me, thanks to Covid I made a few hundred quid once!
"I assume the tax breaks on cars will similarly be cut? oh of course not........"
Possibly, all these suspected measures are somewhere between leaks from Labour to test the water, made up by other parties to give them a platform to argue / fight or just clickbait.
Cars have been hit a few times recently, the only meaningful ones are on EVs or a least very efficient cars when the BIK is lower than the tax rate. It's a measure to cut local pollution for the sake of air quality and possibly over-all pollution. Obviously a lot of people, especially cyclists are quite anti-car and would prefer more bikes, buses, trains and fewer cars, but it's a democracy so you can't have everything we want.
Anyway, EVs are no longer exempt from the Luxury Car Supplement, which puts a lot of them you might not consider a 'Luxury' car into a £600 (ish) a year VED for 6 years because EVs are still more expensive than ICE cars. Subsidises for EVs were withdrawn, but then came back for some.
"Or is it a case of every little helps ?"
This, the Government, whatever you think about them took on a horrible task. National Debt has been increasing wildly since 2008. Banking crisis, Brexit, Covid, Wars, impending / protentional Wars. Nearly £3tn in debt, plus billions lost value through QE. The interest payments on our debt it growing making a bad situation worse.
The economy is on a knife edge, has been pretty much continually since 2008. Unemployment is growing, vacances are down, GDP is flat, interest rates stuck because of inflation, few good news stories to pin a recovery on.
The Sad part is, Labour still won't go near the two massive elephants in the room. 1) Brexit, they say there's a 4% bump in GDP if we rejoin the single market 2) Wealth Taxes, it's been the same story forever, create a myth of a 'middle class' people who mostly still need to work to pay the bills, but because they've got a bit more than average they're no longer working class. Then all 'they' have to do once the line is drawn is get us to fight each other, left v right, Working v Middle, North v South it doesn't matter. We argue about bikes, cars and a penny of income tax on which bracket here or there, blame the middle, blame the bottom, blame the unemployed and sick, blame the boats... But whatever you do, leave the Rich ones alone, give them lots of nice, but complicated ways to avoid any tax.
The closet we came was the 'farmer' tax. Everyone in 'the city' knows it's a scam that actually hurts real farmers. Just let a few millionaires and billionaires buy up all the agricultural land in the UK, before we left the EU they didn't even have to farm it, just take the money. Let it appreciate way, way past the actual value it would have as a way to sell food, and use it to ensure your family will always be generationally wealthy, doesn't matter if they're clever or stupid, hardworking or plain lazy, it doesn't matter, like the Lords before them, they've been born to never join the rat race. The fact that young farmers who actually want to make food can't afford to buy land, ever better, we can rent it to them at just enough to make it sort of worth doing.
Everyone has a different point of view here.
But assuming the main point of the scheme is to make it cheaper / more attractive to cycle to work rather than drive your car - then it should stay in some form. 2 reasons here I can see - less pollution and traffic into cities / built up areas and the health benefits of regularly cycling rather than sat on your bum in the car.
On the above basis, then why limit it to lower or higher paid people - keep it for all. Higher paid people also like to save money and it could still encourage them to use a bike rather than a car.
The only reason there’s a bigger saving for higher earners is because they’re paying a higher tax rate to start with - it’s not like the intention of the scheme is give bigger benefit to higher earners.
That said the scheme does get abused - e.g above where someone intends to buy an expensive e-mtb that is not required for a commute for 99% of people. Maybe there’s an extreme use case where a commute could be off-road - but there are cheaper e-bikes that would cover this off.
How you beat this kind of use is tricky - ideally it would be a check to make sure you are commuting to work regularly - but this is an admin burden on someone that would cost £££. Realistically it would be on the employer I’d think and they could just pull out of offering the scheme if this was expected.
Value of bike could be restricted - maybe a £2.5k-£3k limit which still allows for a decent mid motor commuter ebike but will rule out the majority of full suspension mountain bikes. At a glance you could still get an e cargo bike in this budget - although not a fancy one. On the Bristol / Bath cycle track I do see people using these - sometimes dropping kids to school on the way to work.
Limiting the type of bike - not sure about this one - who makes that decision? I think commuting on a road or gravel type bike is something you see a lot of - my C2W bike is a gravel bike with road components - picked because you can run mudguards and panniers to make a commute more bearable throughout the winter. You don’t need it to be a madly expensive thing though and a £2.5k budget gets you something more than good enough. I’d argue £1.5k on that sort of bike would do the job with an alloy frame / rack mounts etc.
On balance - looking at the above just a maximum value of voucher is probably the cheapest to implement and would have the most affect to stopping c2w being abused.
Leaving aside the point of the scheme - will putting a cap actually make any difference to the budget? Which would be the point of changing it I assume.
If only 6% of bikes are over 2k (from a previous poster above), i'm going to take a stab in the dark and say that most of those are going to be largely higher income earners, who are using the scheme to reduce taxable income to either keep child benefits/free childcare/avoid the 100k 62% marginal rate (the bike being a nice side benefit). I imagine anyone who was doing that, isn't going to go "oh ok, i'll now go and buy my 5k bike and pay taxes on it", they're going to go "oh I still need to reduce my taxable income, i'll shove it in my pension and not buy a bike". And thus no new taxes, all that's been achieved is that the money into the economy has been reduced. You can argue the moral side of it etc but I suspect it will have no or nearly no impact on the money available to the chancellor.
It looks as if the Cycle to Work Scheme is going to be targeted in the up and coming budget, reducing the total spend allowable & trying to bring it back to providing financial assistance for commuters rather than for high-end non-commuter bikes.
It's liable to have an impact on the struggling bike industry as a whole I suspect.
Good, it should have been brought in for those who actually need cheap transport, I’ve never earned a high enough wage to be a beneficiary of the scheme but whilst working in the shop I saw exactly how the scheme was used/abused
And thus no new taxes, all that's been achieved is that the money into the economy has been reduced. You can argue the moral side of it etc but I suspect it will have no or nearly no impact on the money available to the chancellor.
Actually, less taxes, because VAT.
Everyone knows the scheme isn't doing what it is supposed to. This will probably hit me but it's hard to complain.
the limit at my workplace didn't go high enough as all the available cargo bikes at the time were e-bikes and thus around the £3-4k mark, so I went second hand instead.
I bought a cargo ebike on CTW and actually rode it to work! Cycle to Work has totally distorted that market - it doesn’t make sense to buy a perfectly good second hand cargo ebike when for the same pretax money you can get a new one.
