3 Peaks Cycles | Cycle To Work

Effectively you will be sacrificing part of your annual salary in exchange for a benefit. The benefit is being able to hire from your employer a bicycle and the related safety equipment and accessories that you will need to cycle to work.

Example: If you request a certificate for £1,000, your employer will deduct this cost over 12 months and each month £83.33 will be deducted from your gross salary, meaning you will not pay tax and National Insurance on this amount each month. The exact amount you save will depend upon your salary, personal circumstances, and prevailing rates of tax.

You can use your certificate for any adult bike including electric bikes.

You can also use your certificate for most clothing, accessories and tools to make your journey safer or more secure. These include rider essentials such as commuter clothing, shoes and helmets, and vital accessories for your bike including mudguards, lights, reflectors and panniers. There are also important additions for bike longevity including tools, pumps, locks and commuting backpacks.

You can use your certificate for any of the equipment that you may need to either build or upgrade your existing bike, such as groupsets, wheels, componentry and any of the associated accessories or clothing which will make your journey more safe or secure.

This will depend on any limits which your company may have in place. Up until recently there was an HMRC imposed limit of £1,000 but this has now been removed and there are no limits imposed by HMRC. If your company still sets the £1,000 limit you may wish to lobby them so you can obtain your dream bike!

The government guidelines stipulate that you must use it at least 50% of the time to cycle to work. That still leaves plenty of time for you to enjoy riding for pleasure!

The bike and equipment are technically owned by your employer during the hire period.

To ensure that the scheme retains its tax-free status there can be no guarantees that your employer will sell or transfer ownership of the bike to you. HMRC have set guidelines to give bikes a fair market value to ascertain how much the bike is worth at the end of the hire period. For bikes under £500 this is 18% of the original price and for bikes over £500, 25% of the original price.

At the end of the hire period you have three options:

1. Return the bike and equipment to your employer.

2. Continue to hire the bike from your company for a further period of up to 36 months. In most instances your employer will not charge for this.

3. Buy the bike from your employer at the fair market value. Most employers adopt option 2 and at the end of the extended hire period the bike is deemed to have no value and ownership is transferred to you.

There may be a 10% surcharge (payable separately) for any discounted or on sale items bought through one of the schemes. Please contact us beforehand for further information and to clarify if your purchase will incur a surcharge.

Some employers and scheme operators do require a quotation prior to issuing your voucher. Please call into our store, use the enquiry form, or email us at hello@3peakscycles.com and we will be happy to provide one. Please note that a quotation does not reserve your bike.

If you already have a Cyclescheme voucher you can check out online. For all other schemes please send a PDF copy of your voucher as well as the list of your desired items to hello@3peakscycles.com. If you do not already have your voucher please use the enquiry link below.

You can redeem Cyclescheme certificates online. For all other schemes please use the enquiry link below and a member of staff will be in contact within 48 hours to help process your enquiry. Alternatively contact us or visit us in store and we will be happy to help.