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Homeowners are being hit with Ulez charges without leaving the house as tradesmen include fees in bills.
Tradesmen are passing on Sadiq Khan’s daily £12.50 Ulez charge to their customers in invoices in order to off-set the cost of the levy to their businesses.
The additional costs are likely to frustrate customers as self-employed tradesmen can claim back the Ulez charges as a business expense on their tax bills. It also raises questions of whether tradesmen can charge each customer the full £12.50 – even if they are seeing multiple clients in the same area that day.
The Ulez expansion at the end of August extended the scheme to all 32 London boroughs and meant thousands of tradesmen who do not work in central London now have to pay the traffic charge.
Either with a “Ulez surcharge” on their invoice for work or by raising their prices, plumbers, builders and carpenters said they felt they had no choice but to pass on the cost.
If tradesmen incur a Ulez charge five days a week while working on a six-week project, they will pay £375 as a result of the boundary changes.
Danny Madden, of Madden Builders in North London, said his business had bought a £24,000 van for their work near Whetstone, Barnet and Finchley.
“We’ve even had instances where we said to clients, when Ulez was starting, that we need to add the charge of £12.50 per day onto jobs. If you’ve got something over six weeks then that is a massive increase.”
Mr Madden said the £7,000 scrappage support payment was “nowhere near enough” when the business was forced to get rid of their old van, which had cost £30,000.
“The second hand market knows they can push their prices up – it’s difficult to get supply. When we found that truck there were four other people who all wanted it and were ready to put down deposits.”
The Federation of Small Businesses warned before the rollout that traders would struggle with the “heavy handed” expansion.
MD Ahmed, of Prefix Plumbing and Heating, said his engineers were unhappy about the new charges and that they were being forced to pass them on to customers.
“We have had to add more prices for customers. The customers aren’t happy but it is what it is.”
Others are being forced to cough up tens of thousands for new vans, which they say could force them to put their prices up.
Diesel vans that are not compliant with Euro 6 standards are subject to the daily Ulez charge, which includes most vehicles built before 2016.
Matthew Drew, who runs MPD Plumbing near Harrow, said he couldn’t add the Ulez costs to his bills and so had instead chosen to buy a compliant van, spending £36,000.
“I’d just had my other van repaired but it’s too old and I’ve had to buy a new one.
“I get people arguing my rate as it is, without putting the Ulez charge on it. It’s a learning curve for everyone at the moment.”
Conor Lawlor, who set up his business, Raw Wood Projects, earlier this year, has laid out £20,000 on a new van, and said he regularly needs to spend £350 having its filter cleaned.
He said the charges had “caused me a lot of grief” and that he knew “10 other people” who were having to make the same decision about their current vans.
Ahead of the expansion, HMRC confirmed that tradesmen could choose to claim back the cost of the low-emission charge on their tax returns as travel expenses instead.
Transport for London was contacted for comment.