Module 221 min2068 wordsFree — no account
Fringe benefits: valuation, the 2026 threshold, cars, loans and housing
The module’s worked examples, then cases to attempt before revealing their solution · 6 sections · 483 words · 6 min
Worked example
A discount on the company's own products
A household appliance maker sells a washing machine to retailers for 400 euros and lets its own employees buy it for 250. The value of the benefit is the gap between the price charged to retailers, at the same stage of distribution, and what the employee pays: 150 euros, to be added to the year's other fringe benefits.
Worked example
Luca and Andrea
Luca, who has children, receives 1,400 euros in fuel vouchers and bill refunds: he stays under 2,000 euros and nothing becomes income. Andrea, with no children, receives the same: he passes 1,000 euros, and under the paragraph 3 mechanism the full 1,400 euros becomes income. At a 33 percent marginal rate, he pays 462 euros more IRPEF.
Worked example
Three powertrains, one hypothetical cost
Assume, purely for illustration, a running cost of 0.50 euros per kilometre: this is not a figure from the ACI tables. 15,000 kilometres come to 7,500 euros. The fringe benefit is 3,750 euros for a petrol or diesel car, 1,500 for a plug-in hybrid and 750 for an electric car. If the employee pays 1,000 euros a year towards the petrol car, the value falls to 2,750 euros.
Worked example
An interest-free loan
A company lends an employee 20,000 euros interest-free for one year. Assume, purely for illustration, an official reference rate of 3 percent: interest at that rate would be 600 euros, while the interest charged is nil. The fringe benefit is half the gap, 300 euros, to be added to the year's other values.
Worked example
Company accommodation
A farm provides an employee with a flat whose cadastral income is 800 euros, and bears 1,200 euros of costs and utilities that are not the employee's responsibility. The employee pays 600 euros a year. The gap is 800 + 1,200 − 600 = 1,400 euros. If the contract requires the employee to live there, the fringe benefit falls to 30 percent: 420 euros.
Practical case
Totting up Marta's benefits
Marta, an employee with no children, receives in 2026 a 300-euro shopping voucher at Easter, 450 euros of utility refunds in summer and, in December, a 400-euro fuel voucher. Her employer withholds nothing from her pay for them. Does the value of her benefits count as income? Would anything change if the December fuel voucher had not been given?
Hint: Add up the values for the whole year, compare them with the threshold for someone without children, and remember how the paragraph 3 mechanism works.
Show the solution
The threshold for someone without children is 1,000 euros. The three benefits total 300 + 450 + 400 = 1,150 euros: they exceed the threshold, and under the paragraph 3 mechanism the whole year's value becomes income, not just the 150-euro excess. Without the December voucher the total would have been 750 euros, under the threshold: nothing would have become income.
Answer: With the December voucher the full 1,150 euros is income; without it, nothing is
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