EIM21827 | Particular benefits: exemption for sports and recreation facilities: more than one employer involved in providing facilities: restricted use by local residents

More than one employer provides facilities

Employers may group together to provide sports or recreational facilities for members of all their staffs. The fact that such facilities are available to employees of more than one employer does not necessarily mean that they are available to members of the public generally and so excluded.

Restricted use of employer’s facilities by local residents

Where an employer opens their sports facilities not only to their employees generally but also to a restricted section of the public (for example, those who live in the immediate vicinity of the facilities) you should not argue that the facilities are thereby excluded (see EIM21826) as being available to the public generally.

Employment-related right to use facilities (Section 261(5) ITEPA 2003)

For the purposes of the final category in EIM21825, relevant employees and former employees are employees and former employees of an employer to whose employees the facility was available generally.

So a facility shared by employees of two or more employers one of which makes it available only to senior employees will be excluded if it is used wholly or mainly by employees of that employer.