Joule spoke with Audrey Stampaert, co-founder and head of growth at Mbrella about the mobility budget. You can watch the full conversation on our Youtube channel or listen on Spotify. You can read the highlights here!
What is the mobility budget?
The mobility budget is a Belgian incentive that allows employees to exchange their company car for a mobility budget. Employees can use this budget to spend on alternative and sustainable mobility without paying taxes on it.
How do you get started?
If you want to start with the mobility budget as a company, you need to go through two important steps:
- Implement mobility policy: like a car policy, for the mobility budget you also create a formal document with all the ground rules.
- Announcing to employees: you communicate to your employees that they now have the opportunity to enter the mobility budget.
This is then added as an addendum to the employment contract. If your employees opt for the mobility budget, they can exchange the company car for a budget that they are free to fill with a number of (environmentally friendly) options.
What are the benefits of the mobility budget?
For employers, the mobility budget entails no additional cost compared to a company car. This means that switching to a mobility budget is cost-neutral . In addition, there are other benefits. By introducing the mobility budget into your company, you can:
- Reduce carbon footprint and carbon emissions
- Create more attractive salary packages
- Lowering the cost of your fleet
- Giving workers more mobility flexibility
"A 'one-fits-all' salary package with a company car is really not enough in this day and age. Employees want the flexibility to be able to spend their budget on what fits best," said Audrey of Mbrella.
The difference between the mobility budget and the cafeteria plan
The cafeteria plan can also be used to bet on sustainable mobility. What exactly is the difference?
The mobility budget allows employees to exchange their company car for a budget. Employees can freely spend this budget on an almost unlimited number of environmentally friendly mobility options.
A cafeteria plan lets employers set a budget, with which their employees can choose from a menu of benefits (including mobility). Sort of like a cafeteria menu.
Audrey: "The mobility budget is for arranging for day-to-day mobility. Namely, how employees get around to work. The cafeteria plan is a salary optimization like from a thirteenth month or a bonus. The two can also be used perfectly side by side, then you have a complete optimization of your salary package."
Mobility budget
An employee's mobility budget equals the "Total Cost of Ownership" or "TCO" of the company car. The TCO includes all the costs of a car such as leasing, maintenance, insurance, fuel and so on. You are going to convert that total cost of the car into a budget. The employer should make transparent to the employer how much the TCO is in the mobility policy.
Audrey: "The mobility budget is cost neutral for the employer and employee gets a budget based on what the car costs the employer. Mbrella can help calculate the mobility budget."
Who is eligible for the mobility budget?
Can everyone just trade in their company car for a mobility budget?
To enjoy the benefit of the tax exemption, there are some conditions:
- Employers must have provided one or more company cars to one or more employees for a period of 36 months prior to the introduction of the mobility budget.
- Employees can only get the mobility budget if they already have a company car or if they qualify for one. The latter is an important detail: as an employee, you can therefore opt for a mobility budget even if you do not have a company car today.
What can you spend the mobility budget on?
With the mobility budget, you exchange (the budget of) your company car for sustainable mobility options.
Employees can spend the budget on lots of options, as long as there is a link to mobility and that option is sustainable. Those options are divided into pillars:
- Pillar 1: An environmentally friendly company car (95grams of CO2 per kilometer) - such as an electric car or a hybrid.
- Pillar 2: Mobility and housing costs - that goes from personal transportation (e.g., company bicycle), but also public transportation, shared mobility and self-housing costs. Bike leasing and bike purchase fits within this pillar. You can finance all of your leasing package with the mobility budget.
- Pillar 3: Disbursement of the remaining budget at the end of the year at a favorable tax rate.
"The most popular pillar at the moment is housing costs within pillar 2. In fact, the mobility budget allows you to finance your rent or loan, untaxed," Audrey says.
Want to know more about the mobility budget?
Watch the full episode
