Can You Claim Football Tickets as a Business Expense?

Can You Claim Football Tickets as a Business Expense?

Thinking of treating a client to a Premier League match, or sponsoring a local club and calling it a “marketing” expense? Before you do that, let’s see whether HMRC will let you write it off.

Taking Clients to a Match

If you buy football tickets for clients, that’s client entertainment. So:

• Yes, the company can pay for them.
• No, you don’t get corporation tax relief, and you can’t reclaim VAT.
  Even if the match is high-profile for example Champions League, Premier League or local; it stays under “entertainment” in the eyes of HMRC.

Need help with expenses?

Calling Tickets a Gift

You might try to frame tickets as a “gift”, but HMRC will still treat them as entertainment. The no-relief rule applies.

Staff Events & Football Outings

When it’s for your team, things change a bit:

• If you offer a staff “football match day out” to all employees, and it stays under HMRC’s £150 per head threshold, you might claim it.
• If it’s limited to directors or key clients, HMRC could treat it as a benefit in kind.
• It helps if you call it a “corporate day out” or “team event” rather than “football outing for the boss’s mates”.

Sponsorship of Clubs

This is often the best route to get relief. If you sponsor a local or semi-pro club, and in return get branding, advertising or exposure (e.g. your logo on kits, pitch boards, website) then:

• That expense is more likely to be allowed for corporation tax.
• VAT may be recoverable (because it’s more like marketing).
  Just make sure it’s genuine football sponsorship, not just a ticket scheme dressed up.

Hospitality, Boxes & Season Tickets

• A hospitality box or football hospitality package, when used for clients, remains entertainment, so no tax relief.
• A season ticket kept by the company and used by a director? HMRC may classify it as a benefit in kind, meaning personal tax to pay.
• Even for staff, season tickets are tricky, only certain schemes or allowances might allow relief.

Bribery and Reasonableness

Under the Bribery Act, hospitality must be reasonable and proportionate.
Taking a client to an ordinary football match is normally okay. But if you’re doing it often or with top-tier VIP access, it might look like you’re dangling something to win business.

VAT Side of Things

• VAT on entertainment (tickets, food, travel) is not reclaimable.
• VAT on sponsorship or advertising (for example in club match programmes or pitch signage) can be reclaimed, assuming it genuinely markets your business.

Final Whistle Summary

• Client tickets / hospitality / match days = entertainment = no tax relief.
• Staff events = maybe, if within HMRC’s rules.
• Sponsorship = your best bet if it gives real exposure.
• Hospitality boxes / season tickets = likely treated as a benefit and not deductible.
• Beware of “too flashy” gestures under bribery rules.

⚽ In short: you can use the company to fund football costs, but that doesn’t usually mean it saves you tax, except in sponsorship or well-structured staff events.

👉 Call Blue Rocket Accounting on 01322 555442 to talk through whether your football spend can legitimately become a tax-friendly expense.

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