HMRC's September 2026 advisory fuel rates are now live, and for fully electric company cars the headline is simple: the EV rates have stayed where they were.
- Home charging: 7 pence per mile
- Public charging: 15 pence per mile
That might sound like a non-event. In practice, it is a useful quarterly checkpoint for anyone reimbursing EV business journeys, especially if drivers use a mix of home, workplace and public charging.
What changed on 1 September 2026?
HMRC updates advisory fuel rates every quarter, with new tables usually taking effect on 1 March, 1 June, 1 September and 1 December. The September 2026 update moved some petrol, diesel and LPG rates, but the advisory electric rates for fully electric company cars remain unchanged at 7p per mile for home charging and 15p per mile for public charging.
HMRC's calculation shows why those figures land where they do. For the September table, it uses a weighted EV efficiency of 3.59 miles per kWh, with electricity costs of 24.47p/kWh for home charging and 54p/kWh for public charging under 50kW. Rounded to the nearest whole penny, that becomes 7p and 15p per mile.
Why an unchanged EV rate still matters
The rate staying flat does not mean the admin can be ignored. It means your reimbursement setup should be checked rather than blindly changed.
For a driver doing 600 business miles in a company EV during September:
- all home-charged mileage would reimburse at £42.00 using the advisory rate;
- all public-charged mileage would reimburse at £90.00 using the advisory rate;
- a fair split, such as 400 miles home and 200 miles public, would come to £58.00.
That gap is large enough to make rough guesses uncomfortable. If the driver relies on public charging for work trips, the charging location is not a tiny detail. It is the difference between a fair claim and a month-end argument.
Public rapid charging can still cost more than 15p per mile
The September advisory public rate is based on slower public charging under 50kW. That is important, because many business journeys lean on rapid or ultra-rapid chargers.
Zapmap's August 2026 Price Index put average pay-as-you-go public charging at 54p/kWh for 3kW to 49kW chargers, which it converts to around 16p per mile for an average EV. For rapid and ultra-rapid charging of 50kW and above, the average was 77p/kWh, around 23p per mile.
HMRC allows a higher amount than the advisory rate where you can show the fuel or electricity cost per mile is higher. So the practical answer is not simply "pay 15p for every public mile". If a driver has to use rapid charging for a work journey, keep enough evidence to explain the higher cost: the charger price, charging session, journey purpose and business miles.
Do not mix up company EVs and personal EVs
The advisory electric rates apply to company cars. HMRC says advisory fuel rates should only be used for employees using company cars, either for reimbursing business travel or for working out repayment for private travel.
If an employee uses their own car for business journeys, the separate mileage allowance payments rules apply instead. For 2026/27, the employer rates page lists cars at 55p per mile for the first 10,000 business miles for tax purposes, then 25p per mile after that. That 55p rate covers the overall cost of using the private car; it is not an extra EV charging allowance.
A September checklist for EV mileage records
If you run payroll, approve expenses or claim EV business mileage, use the September update as a quick audit point:
- Check the date range. Make sure September journeys use the September 2026 table, not an older template.
- Keep the EV rates unchanged. If your template already used 7p home and 15p public from June, the EV numbers should not move.
- Separate charging locations. A company EV charged partly at home and partly in public needs a fair and reasonable split.
- Record exceptions. Rapid charging, hotel charging, charging-card use and employer-paid workplace charging can all affect the story.
- Label the vehicle setup. Company EV and personal EV claims follow different rules, so do not let them share the same workflow.
How Mileage Tracker helps
The boring part of EV reimbursement is also the part that saves the most time later: a clean journey history.
With Mileage Tracker, drivers can keep business and personal journeys separate, add notes for charging context, and export mileage totals when payroll or accounts need them. That is especially useful now that EV reimbursement is not just about miles driven, but also about where the car was charged and which HMRC rule applies.
Practical takeaway: for September 2026, do not change the EV advisory rates unless your policy uses evidenced actual costs. Do check that every EV mileage claim has the right date, vehicle type and charging-location evidence behind it.
Track every mile with less faff
Ready to keep your EV mileage, trips, and running costs tidy?
Mileage Tracker helps you log journeys, stay on top of costs, and keep cleaner records for work or personal driving.