It had been proposed that there will be a new statutory exemption for trivial benefits up to a limit of £50 from from 6 April 2015, this measure is not included in the first Finance Bill of 2015, it has been deferred until after the election.

The £50 tax exemption would have been on items such as birthday and Christmas gifts. The legislation would have also introduced an annual cap of £300 in some circumstances.

So we are stuck with the old rules for now

An employer may provide employees with a seasonal gift, such as a turkey, an ordinary bottle of wine or a box of chocolates at Christmas. All of these gifts can be treated as trivial benefits. . For an employer with a large number of employees the total cost of providing a gift to each employee may be considerable, but where the gift to each employee is a trivial benefit, this principle applies regardless of the total cost to the employer and the number of employees concerned. If a benefit is trivial it should not be included in a PSA (EIM21861).

http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/manuals/eimanual/EIM21863.htm

There are some non taxable benefits you be interested in….

HMRC Helpsheet 207 – Non-taxable payments or benefits for employees

http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/helpsheets/hs207.pdf

steve@bicknells.net