If you cut and style hair in your clients' homes, your tax return looks different from a salon owner's. You are usually self-employed, you drive between jobs all day, and you run the admin side from your kitchen table. Three questions decide how much tax you pay: does your home count as your business base, how do you claim the driving, and what can you take for use of home?
Get those three right and you claim everything you are due without overstating it. Get them wrong and you either overpay tax or leave a hole in your records that HMRC can pick apart.
This guide is for self-employed mobile hairdressers, barbers and beauty therapists filing Self Assessment for 2026/27. It explains the rules in plain English, with the gov.uk references behind each one. If you would rather hand the whole thing over, that is what we do for hairdressers and beauty professionals.
Does my home count as my business base?
This is the question everything else hangs on, because it decides whether your driving is allowable.
The general rule is that you cannot claim for travel between home and work. That is ordinary commuting, and it is not deductible. So if you drove to the same salon every day, those miles would not count.
A mobile hairdresser is in a different position. Your trade is itinerant by nature. You have no fixed workplace, you go from client to client, and you run the business itself, the bookings, the records, the stock, from home. HMRC's own guidance treats trades like this as having their base of operations at home, following the principle in the tax case Horton v Young (a bricklayer who worked at a series of different sites). The same logic covers a mobile hairdresser who works at a series of different homes.
When your home is genuinely your base of operations, the travel from home out to your clients and back is business travel, not commuting, so the mileage is allowable. HMRC's Business Income Manual sets this out at BIM37620.
There is one limit worth knowing. The home has to be a real base, not a token one. If your work is concentrated in one area a long way from where you live, HMRC can argue the distant area is your real workplace and the long trip to reach it is commuting. For most mobile hairdressers working a normal local round from a home that holds the diary, stock and admin, that is not an issue.
How do I claim mileage as a mobile hairdresser?
Once your home is the base, you have two ways to claim the cost of your car.
The simplified mileage method. You claim a flat rate per business mile and forget about the actual running costs. The HMRC approved mileage rates for cars and vans are 45p per mile for the first 10,000 business miles in the tax year, then 25p per mile after that. For motorbikes it is 24p per mile. These rates have been unchanged for years and apply for 2026/27.
The flat rate is meant to cover the lot: fuel, insurance, servicing, repairs, road tax and the wear on the vehicle. You do not claim those separately on top. You can still claim parking and tolls on a business trip, and other travel such as a train fare, separately.
The actual-cost method. Instead of the flat rate, you work out the real running costs of the car for the year and claim the business-use proportion, plus capital allowances on the vehicle itself. This means keeping fuel receipts and totting up insurance, servicing and the rest, then applying your business mileage percentage.
Whichever method you choose, you must keep a mileage log. Record the date, the journey, the reason and the miles. HMRC expects to see how you arrived at the figure, and a contemporaneous log is far more convincing than a number reconstructed at year end.
One rule catches people out. Once you start using the simplified mileage rate for a particular vehicle, you have to keep using it for that vehicle for as long as you use it in the business. You cannot swap to actual costs partway through that car's life. You also cannot use the mileage rate if you have already claimed capital allowances on the same vehicle. So pick your method when you first use the car for work.
If you want to see the difference on your own numbers, our mileage calculator does the sums both ways.
What can I claim for use of home?
You run the business side from home, so part of your home costs are a business expense. There are two ways to claim, and they mirror the mileage choice.
The flat rate (simplified expenses). HMRC lets you claim a fixed monthly amount based on how many hours a month you work from home, with no need to split bills. You have to work at least 25 hours a month from home to use it.
| Hours worked from home per month | Flat rate per month |
|---|---|
| 25 to 50 | £10 |
| 51 to 100 | £18 |
| 101 or more | £26 |
The flat rate covers the household running costs such as heat, light and power. It does not cover telephone or internet, so you claim the business share of those separately on top.
For a mobile hairdresser, the hours that count here are your admin hours at home: taking bookings, messaging clients, ordering stock, doing the books and prepping kit. The hours you spend in clients' homes do not count, because that work is not done at your home.
The actual-cost method. You add up the running costs of your home (a fair share of heating, lighting, council tax, rent or mortgage interest, insurance and so on) and claim a reasonable business proportion, usually based on the number of rooms used for business and the time they are used. This can give a bigger claim than the flat rate, but it needs more record-keeping and a defensible basis for the split.
Simplified expenses or actual costs: which is better?
There is no single right answer. It depends on your mileage, your home costs and how much admin you do.
Simplified expenses (the flat mileage rate and the flat use-of-home rate) are quick, hard for HMRC to challenge, and need the least paperwork. For a hairdresser with a modest car and a few admin hours a week, they often give a perfectly fair result.
Actual costs can be worth more if you drive an expensive vehicle, do very high mileage, or use a meaningful part of your home for long hours. The trade-off is more record-keeping and, on the vehicle, locking into capital allowances.
You do not have to use the same approach for both. You can take simplified mileage for the car and actual costs for the home, or the other way round. Pick the combination that gives the fairest, best-supported claim. Note that simplified expenses are only available to sole traders and partnerships with no corporate partners; they cannot be used by limited companies. If you trade through a limited company, the rules are different and worth a conversation.
Illustrative example: a mobile hairdresser's travel and home claim
Illustrative example. Priya is a self-employed mobile hairdresser working a local round from home, which holds her diary, products and paperwork. In 2026/27 she drives 8,000 business miles and spends about 60 hours a month on admin at home (bookings, ordering, accounts).
She uses simplified expenses for both.
| Claim | Working | Amount |
|---|---|---|
| Business mileage (8,000 miles at 45p) | 8,000 x £0.45 | £3,600 |
| Use of home (51 to 100 hours band, £18 a month x 12) | £18 x 12 | £216 |
| Total travel and home claim | £3,816 |
All 8,000 miles fall within the first 10,000, so they are at 45p; none reach the 25p rate. Priya's mileage is allowable because her home is her genuine base of operations and the trips out to clients are business travel, not commuting.
These figures are illustrative. Your own claim depends on your actual mileage, hours and costs, and on whether the flat rates or actual costs serve you better.
What other expenses can a mobile hairdresser claim?
Travel and use of home are the two that cause the most confusion, but they are not the whole picture. As a self-employed hairdresser you can also claim the everyday costs of running the trade, provided each is incurred wholly and exclusively for the business. Typically that includes:
- Products and consumables: colour, shampoo, conditioner, styling product, foils, gloves and towels.
- Tools and equipment: scissors, clippers, dryers, a portable chair and your kit bag. Larger items may be capital and claimed through the Annual Investment Allowance instead of as a running cost.
- Insurance: public liability and professional treatment cover.
- Laundry of work towels and uniform, and protective clothing.
- Training to maintain or update your existing skills, plus professional subscriptions.
- Phone and internet, business proportion, on top of the use-of-home flat rate.
- Accountancy and bookkeeping fees.
Keep a receipt for everything and a clean record of your income, including cash and tips. Good records are what turn a defensible claim into an easy one, and they are exactly what we set up for our hairdressing and beauty clients so the year-end return is painless.
Want your mileage, use of home and expenses claimed correctly for 2026/27? Book a free call with a Zmartly accountant and we will make sure you claim everything you are due, with the records to back it up.
Frequently asked questions
Can a mobile hairdresser claim mileage from home to clients?
Yes, in most cases. Because a mobile hairdresser has no fixed workplace and runs the business from home, the home is treated as the base of operations, so trips out to clients are business travel rather than commuting. You can claim 45p per mile for the first 10,000 business miles in 2026/27 and 25p per mile after that, or your actual running costs instead.
How much can a self-employed hairdresser claim for working from home?
If you use HMRC's flat rate, you claim £10 a month for 25 to 50 hours of home working, £18 for 51 to 100 hours, or £26 for 101 hours or more. You must work at least 25 hours a month from home to use the flat rate, and it does not cover phone or internet, which you claim separately.
Do I have to keep a mileage log?
Yes. Whichever method you use, you need to record the date, route, reason and miles for each business journey. HMRC expects to see how you worked out your claim, and a log kept as you go is far more reliable than a figure estimated at the end of the year.
Can I use the flat mileage rate and actual home costs at the same time?
Yes. You can mix and match: take the simplified flat rate for your car and claim actual costs for your home, or the reverse. Choose the combination that gives the fairest and best-supported claim. Once you use the flat mileage rate for a vehicle, though, you must keep using it for that vehicle.
Can a mobile hairdresser running a limited company use simplified expenses?
No. Simplified expenses, both the flat mileage rate and the flat use-of-home rate, are only available to sole traders and partnerships without corporate partners. If you trade through a limited company, different rules apply, so it is worth taking advice on the most tax-efficient way to claim travel and home costs.
