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I am looking into my company's response to sustainability demands. Amongst many other ideas, it was suggested that the company help with funding employees' environmental projects. These could range from Electric car purchase, to home solar panel installation.

Would salary sacrifice be a method of reimbursing the company's investment? (Currently there are Salary sacrifice schemes for pensions, and also for bicycle purchase for ride to work.)

Note: The company is in the UK - Wales to be precise, but I think Wales follows the same Salary Sacrifice rules as England.

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    Rules about salary sacrifice differ by country. please specify the country. Commented Jul 23, 2021 at 9:59
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    This seems more like a question about corporate finances. Depending on your country, you would just receive a pre-tax benefit in exchange for a lower salary, but your company would be weighing the cost of replacing your deductible salary with a different expense.
    – chepner
    Commented Jul 23, 2021 at 12:38
  • Is this any different from a more general scheme where the company offers loans to employees?
    – Simon B
    Commented Jul 24, 2021 at 22:38
  • @mhoran_psprep The company is in the UK - Wales to be precise, but I think Wales follows the same Salary Sacrifice rules as England. Commented Jul 26, 2021 at 7:31
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    Just a general note on the right way to answer this (IMO): salary sacrifice schemes in the UK need to fall within a specific government scheme/exemption to be effective at saving tax and maybe NI, which is really the whole point of them - otherwise employees could just buy the benefit themselves out of taxed pay. I can't find a definitive reference so am not answering immediately, but I am aware that there is a scheme for electric car purchase and not aware of any for home solar panels. Commented Jul 26, 2021 at 11:07

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You can't pay for Solar PV or Biomass with salary sacrifice.

Historical note:

Unfortunately I was probably the source of getting the Solar PV and Biomass, and other sources of incentive payment schemes taken off the Salary Sacrifice list. They were on until I met with Danny Alexander, Dep to the Treasury, and then taken off a few months later in the new FY.

Essentially nobody had connected the benefit of FITs/RHI with the Tax incentive under Salary Sacrifice. What this means is that with say PV a general saving in electric to the bill and the FITs payments received around 2014 meant about a 7 yr payback on investment. However if Your employer allowed the Salary Sacrifice scheme, and you found a means of credit, base tax payers were repaying in 4 yrs and higher rate tax payers in less than 2. Now getting 20yrs of reduced bills and full FITs meant a very nice return on investment! Danny was rather shocked at the time and action was essentially taken very shortly thereafter.

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