Travel time between assignments as working time

There are two different legal questions bundled into this, and they have different answers. Whether travel time counts as “working time” for health and safety limits under the Working Time Regulations 1998 is a separate question from whether that time must be paid, and paid at the National Minimum Wage. I will deal with each.

Travel between assignments during the working day

Travel from one workplace or assignment to another in the course of the day generally does count, both as working time and as time that must be paid at least the minimum wage.

Under the National Minimum Wage Regulations 2015, regulation 34, time spent travelling for the purposes of work is treated as working time that must be paid, unless the travel is between the worker’s home and a place of work. Critically, regulation 34(2)(a) expressly includes hours spent travelling to carry out assignments at different places between which the worker is obliged to travel, where those places are not occupied by the employer. HMRC’s own National Minimum Wage Manual confirms that for a worker doing “time work”, time spent travelling in connection with the employment is treated as working time. So a care worker, engineer or contractor moving between clients or sites during the day is entitled to be paid at least the minimum wage for that travel time.

For the separate purpose of the 48 hour weekly limit and rest breaks under the Working Time Regulations 1998, travel that is an integral part of carrying out the job during the working day also counts as working time.

Travel between home and work (ordinary commuting)

The ordinary daily commute between home and a fixed place of work does not count as working time for minimum wage purposes, and it is not automatically payable. GOV.UK guidance on calculating the minimum wage states plainly that travelling between home and work does not count, regardless of whether the worker has a fixed place of work, unless the worker is actually working while travelling.

Workers with no fixed workplace

The position is more nuanced for mobile workers who have no fixed base and travel from home to their first assignment and back from their last. For the purposes of the Working Time Regulations 1998, the Court of Justice decision in Federación de Servicios Privados v Tyco established that, where a worker has no fixed or habitual place of work, the time spent travelling between home and the first and last customers of the day is working time. That matters for the 48 hour limit and rest entitlements.

However, that ruling concerned working time, not pay. For minimum wage purposes in England and Wales the domestic Regulations still treat home to first job and last job to home travel as excluded, so it does not by itself have to be paid. This is an area where “counts as working time” and “must be paid” diverge, and it is a common source of confusion.

Whether it must actually be paid

It is important to separate three things. First, whether the time is working time for the 48 hour limit and rest rules. Second, whether it must be paid at least the minimum wage. Third, whether it is paid at your normal or contractual rate. The minimum wage rules only require that, taking the pay reference period as a whole, your total pay divided by all the hours that count does not fall below the minimum wage. Whether you receive your full hourly rate for travel time, rather than merely satisfying the minimum wage floor, depends on your contract of employment.

What determines your position

Several facts change the answer, so check the following before concluding you are owed anything.

1. Whether you have a fixed workplace or are a genuinely mobile worker with no fixed base.

2. Whether the travel is between two work locations during the day, or is the first or last leg from or to home.

3. What your contract, staff handbook or offer letter say about travel time and travel pay, including whether travel is paid at a lower rate.

4. Whether, once travel time is included, your average pay across the pay reference period still meets the minimum wage.

5. Whether you are actually working while travelling, for example taking work calls, which can convert otherwise excluded travel into payable time.

Practical next steps

If you believe travel between assignments is not being paid when it should be, start by reviewing your contract and any travel policy, then gather records of your travel between sites, dates, times and mileage. Raise it informally with your employer or line manager first, explaining that inter-assignment travel counts under regulation 34 of the National Minimum Wage Regulations 2015. If that does not resolve it, put a clear written grievance or complaint to your employer.

If it remains unresolved, you can report a minimum wage underpayment to HMRC, which can investigate and require arrears to be paid, or bring a claim in the employment tribunal for unlawful deduction from wages, normally within three months less one day of the last underpayment, subject to ACAS early conciliation. ACAS can advise on the pay dispute and provide the early conciliation that is a required step before most tribunal claims.

Key missing information

To give you a definite answer I would need to know whether you have a fixed workplace, whether the travel in question is between two jobs in the day or the home leg, what your contract says about travel and travel pay, and your sector, since the care sector in particular has been the subject of numerous minimum wage travel time enforcement cases.