Human Resources

The sustainable Sussex car benefit scheme

Find out how you could be driving away in a brand new lower-carbon car as part of our Sustainable Sussex Car Benefit Scheme.

How you can benefit

We have partnered with Tusker (a UK-based vehicle management and leasing company) to give you access to new and affordable electric and plug-in hybrid cars so we can support lower carbon commuting – to and from work and beyond. 

This scheme forms part of our vision to become one of the most sustainable universities in the world.

Find out more about our sustainabilty strategy. 

By taking steps to travel more sustainably, we can work together to reduce our community's carbon footprint. We want to support all of our staff to use other sustainable travel alternatives to driving, including:

About the scheme

A fixed monthly amount is taken directly from your gross salary. In addition to a brand new, lower-carbon car, the scheme also includes:

  • no deposit
  • maintenance of the vehicle including all servicing, batteries, exhausts and tyres
  • fully comprehensive motor insurance including all business travel for you
  • annual road tax
  • home charging point with standard installation*
  • roadside assistance (homestart and recovery UK and European cover)
  • relief car for when your car is off the road (if selected). 

How to access the scheme

Check your eligibility for the scheme, get a quote and see the range of cars available.

To access the site you will need to log in. To create an account, you will need your employee number (found on your payslip) and your company code, which for Sussex is: TUOS.

If you need further help, or you want to chat to Tusker about ordering a car, you can get in contact by phone: 0333 400 7431 or email: EETeam@tuskerdirect.com. 

Eligibility to lease under this scheme:

1)    Your contract of employment length needs to exceed the requested lease agreement period length

2)    You need to have been in post at Sussex for a minimum of 3 months

3)    You will need to earn above the National Minimum Wage (NMW) after the salary sacrifice amount has been taken from your gross salary, which means you will need to earn a minimum gross contractual salary of £29,000 to access cars on the scheme, subject to other deductions. If you earn lower than this amount, you will not be able to see any cars on the scheme as this will take your salary below the NMW.

HR will check these facts once you have made your request and will only be able to agree to the request if the criteria are met.

Please note, NHS staff members on salary sacrifice schemes will have different salary and pension implications. Please see here for more information.

If you have any questions around your eligibility please contact the Reward Team at reward@sussex.ac.uk.

Watch the webinar 

Tusker held a webinar for Sussex staff, which explained how the scheme works. View the webinar below. 

Video transcript 

Joanna Banks: Let's just start by introducing myself this morning. My name is Joanna Banks and I'm your employer account manager for the car scheme.

And I'm also joined this morning by Reece, who is our marketing executive.

So we'll be taking you through the scheme in detail, providing you with lots of information and hopefully answering all those pressing queries that you may have.

Now, if you've got any questions throughout the webinar, you can simply drop these into the chat and Reece will kindly pick these up for me.

However, we will also have some time at the end and will be able to open it up for any questions then as well.

Okay, so let's get started. Before we jump straight into the scheme, let's just give you a little bit of information on who exactly is Tusker.

So we are the market's leader in providing salary sacrifice schemes, and it's been our main sole focus for many years.

And we have currently well over 1500 active schemes across employers in the UK for private and public sector.

Three key stats for you. We actually launched the first scheme in 2009.

We have an average rating of 4.3 out of five on TRUSTPILOT and we have around 25,000 cars on the road, which is sneaking upwards on a monthly basis now.

What sets us apart from our competitors is we have a stock and arriving soon page, which is pretty integral to our business at the moment.

I'm not sure whether you're aware or not, but there are ongoing issues within the auto industry and there are some more lengthy, lengthier lead times.

These cars are actually available with a much quicker turnaround time and we do have new models dropping weekly.

Currently, at the moment, over 50% of our new orders are coming from that page.

Next Tusker are very unique in that we offset all tailpipe emissions of vehicles on fleet, which also covers emissions associated with electric charging.

For the past few years, we have actually been net positive contributors.

You can also choose a contract anywhere between 24 to 48 months.

And finally, we have lifestyle protections in place, which is an enhanced cover for you
should your circumstances change.

This essentially supports you with early termination costs in situations that may crop up and cause difficulties with you for your ability to pay for the vehicle.

There's lots more information on that, when I actually get into that and further slides down.

How does the scheme work then? When you order a car via our website, Tusker agrees to provide an electric or plug in hybrid vehicle to your employer, and then your employer agrees to provide this vehicle to you in exchange for some of your salary.

You reduce your gross salary in exchange for the use of a brand new electric or plug in hybrid car and you save tax and national insurance on the amount being sacrificed.

It is considered by the HMRC to be taxable benefit.

So you will pay benefits in-kind. This is often referred to as a company car taxed on the benefit received.

In summary, then you reduce your salary by a fixed monthly amount in exchange for the use of an electric or plug in hybrid car.

You save tax and National Insurance. However, you will pay a benefits in kind on the benefit received.

And this does equate to potential net savings for you.

Let's have a look at benefits in-kind. So over the past ten years, HMRC benefits in kind rates have reduced on ultralow emission vehicles and savings are really enhanced for the EV drivers for electric cars.

The benefits in-kind is fixed up until April 2025 and then this increases by 1% annually up until April 2028.

Now, hybrids are also lower on the benefits in-kind scale.

However, they will differ dependent on the CO2 and electric range.

If we just quickly have a look at the benefit in-kind calculation, now there is a calculator on the portal which is really useful.

This will help you, but also the system always calculates into your quotes as well, so it's always transparent to you.

But what you do for the calculation is you will take the p11d value of the vehicle and then you multiply it by the vehicle's CO2 percentage, which is located on the chart shown on the right hand side of the slide.

And that's actually the government confirmed sliding scale figures.

You then multiply that by your tax band, so that would either be 20 or 40% that will give you your annual benefits and current cost.

So if we just have a look at the two examples, we can look at the one on the left hand side prior to April 2020, these were the older benefit in-kind rates.

But for an electric vehicle with a p11d value of £30,000.

Historically, that was 16% benefit in-kind rates and that would have equated to £4,800 per year.

Now, you wouldn't pay that figure. You would pay the tax against that figure.

So if you were a 20% taxpayer, it would have been £80 per month.

And if you're 40% taxpayer, that would have equated to £160 per month.

However, if we fast forward to April 2022, where the rates were drastically reduced for the same vehicle, it's an electric vehicle, £30,000 p11d value, it's now a fixed 2% benefit in kind rate, which equates to £600 per year.

So you would pay the tax against that £600.

So if you're a 20% taxpayer that now works out at £10 per month, and if you're a 40% taxpayer, that now equates to £20 per month.

So now is really the best time to be investing in the electric vehicle specifically.

But like we said, the benefit in-kind is also better on the benefit in-kind range.

It just increases dependent CO2 or the electric range.

What's included in the scheme now? So the maintenance and servicing is included as well as tyre replacement.

Now it's a no quibble tyre policy. So what that actually means is that you can go into any of the quick fit branches or you can also organise a mobile unit to come out to either your workplace or home place and they will be able to charge.

Sorry they will be able to change and they will be able to change the tyre at your chosen place.

There's also European breakdown cover and recovery, which has been specifically enhanced.

So you can take that away and still remain covered.

There is also a home charge point with standard installation, and this is subject to terms and conditions.
And I will give you more information on some further slides along on the free home charge point.

There is also accident management. Which, I'm sorry, the accident management has actually been put into place.

This is one of the really good benefits, it's puts into place to take the stress of the situation off your hands as we manage it for you.

So if you were to have an incident, then you would call through to the accident management team.

Sorry. Just give me a moment. If you were to have an incident.

And when you call for you to the accident management team on the driver line and they will take all the details over the phone from you.

The repair is actively managed in house with the insurer basically minimising all the time off the road.

If there's a third party involved, then they will manage the claim and we keep any losses which are associated with that.

There's also a replacement car which will be provided for the duration of the repairs.

Now there is an insurance excess of £250.

However, if it's confirmed as a third party liability, you will receive that back once the claim has been finalised.

Next, there is fully comprehensive insurance, which includes business cover for you.

And you do have the option to include additional drivers.

And then finally, there are those all important lifestyle protections, which I again will go into more detail in some further slides along.

Let's have a look at what's not included now. So any motoring fines or penalty points.

So fines will either be recharged or referred to you with an admin fee of £10 plus VAT.

We do have a third party supplier who handle all of our fines, so in the first instance the fine will be paid to stop it escalating and then you will be notified via email.

Now, don't worry, because this doesn't prevent anyone from challenging the fine and a dispute can be raised on your behalf if needed.

Next. Damage due to driver misuse or abuse.

Now we always encourage you to get any damage repaired before handing your vehicle back, but you can submit an insurance claim prior to the end of the agreement and arrange a repair that way.

Or you can also source your own reputable repairer.

Now you can return the vehicle with damage, however, that will be graded in line with the DVLA guidelines.

And there's a fixed cost matrix as well, which makes sure the costs are quite transparent for you.

Next, any fluids outside of servicing? So that would be washer fluid, engine oil, adblue, etc.

And then finally, any excess mileage at the end of the agreement.

It's really important that you keep your eye on your contracted mileage.

So if you find after the first 12 months that you're noticeably performing over or under the contracted mileage, then do make contact with Tusker.

And we can recontract that for you. Let's just have a recap on all the benefits now.

It's fixed cost motoring. Therefore, there's no hidden costs allowing you to plan your budget and have peace of mind.

Essentially, everything's included. The only thing that you need to add is the fuel, either the petrol or the electricity to make the vehicle go.

There are cars that you can build here in specification or there are also cars that are available for a quick delivery through the cars arriving soon section.

There's no deposit. There are income tax and national insurance savings.

It's comprehensive motor insurance policy, including business cover for you and there are the option for additional drivers.

Tusker do require enhanced manufacturer and fleet discounts and these are passed across to you the driver.

There are home charge points, with installation, with standard installation included.

It is low benefit in-kind on electric vehicles.

And again, there are early termination protections, which is also that lifestyle protections which I mentioned, which cover certain scenarios such as redundancy, resignation, TUPE, retirement, long term sick, maternity and paternity.

So let me go into some further information on lifestyle protections here.

So this is in place really if you have a change in circumstances such as, if you were to resign, retire or get made redundant, there wouldn't be any early termination financial penalties for you as the employee outside of the exclusion period. There is a three month exclusion period from the point of delivery.

However, following that you can simply hand the car back without any early to early termination charges.

This also covers maternity, paternity, adoption leave cover, and this would come into play when your salary hits statutory pay, and that means you are no longer in a position to be able to reduce your gross pay to cover the costs.

Long term sick and loss of licence due to medical conditions are also covered, and these are all subject to the terms and conditions within your company policy.

And again, this would come into play when your salary hits statutory pay.

And again, you're no longer in a position to be able to cover those costs with what you have in your gross pay.

So if we take this into consideration, we've worked alongside your employer to really ensure that we've built a scheme for you that offers you complete peace of mind.

So typically, if we were to compare and look at a personal lease arrangement, if your circumstances changed, you would still be liable for all those monthly payments on a personal lease.

Or if you wanted to come out of that contract early, you would definitely be charged an early termination fee as well.

Moving on to getting the all important home charge points.

Once you have confirmed your order, it's been authorised and placed, you will receive a confirmation email from the order and delivery team.

And in the body of this email there will be a link for you to click to access charge points.

The link will take you through to our supplier ChargedEV.

They will know that your scheme is free of charge and they will then start the process of the desktop survey or site survey.

So it's really important to know how you're going to charge it.

So this is to basically make sure that your your home is suitable to have that installed.

And once you get that survey, they'll ask you a number of questions and also ask you to take a few pictures which you send back to them.

And they should be able to tell from there whether your home's suitable for a charge point.

But if they can't make the decision from that survey, then they will send an engineer out just to double check.

It's very rare that there are occasions, I have not come across one yet, where we've not been able to have one installed.

So the charge point is standard installation, which is free of charge.

If a standard installation happens to not be standard, and that could just be something like that sometimes if the charge point is over a certain distance away from your electric metre and it needs additional cable, that can sometimes be an additional cost. And if there are any additional costs, then they will be chargeable across to you.

Now you do have the option to fix the charge point at your home address.

However, if you don't have the option to have that at your home address, you can actually also have it installed at the address of a relative or friend.

So all this is subject to the terms and conditions, and we've just put a hyperlink in there for you.

But it will be at tuskercars.com/welcome/chargepoint.

In terms of eligibility, you will be eligible if you meet the following criteria.

So you need to be a permanent employee, with over three months of service, and you don't fall below a national living or minimum wage by taking a car on the scheme.

Let's have a look at the online training.

So once you log into the portal. And you create an account.

We will ask for some key details from you, such as your salary and address.

And this basically allows the system to provide you with tailored quotes and show the level of savings based on your details.

No quote is going to be the same for another driver because it does depend on factors like your salary and your address will differ all the quotes.

Once you've logged in, you can browse the cars that are available or you can build a vehicle to your exact specification.
There are also frequently asked questions to give you more information on how the scheme works.

There's also an overview of your company scheme policy on this and fantastic supporting videos, which I just think help explain in better detail.

And sometimes it's just easier to understand and you're just reading the notes on the portal.

So I always recommend utilising all the information that is available to you on there.

But if we do find that you still have queries or you're unsure of of something or you just need some further information, we do have a dedicated employee engagement team who are there for you to support, and I will give you that contact details on the final slide.

There is an extensive search criteria.

You can search for a specific make or model, or you can further drill down into the search based on car style, electric range, number of seats, number of doors, boot size. And we've also got automatic or manual now that you can choose.

Or alternatively, if you go on to the stock arriving soon page, you can find that in the menu bar as well.

If we are looking to build your own vehicle, then once you select a car and you can build it to your exact specifications.

So you would start by selecting the type and variant of the model and then click configure and it will bring through a further selection of options, which you can see on the right hand side and slide that.

You can then select the colour trim and any additional cost options. If an option box is highlighted, ringed around in red that means you have to choose an option within that, otherwise it won't let you move forward within the quote.

There are two options just to raise your attention to for servicing.

Now the first one is premier independent servicing, and that option is included as standard. It will auto populate against that one, it comes standard within your agreement.

Basically, it means that when your car needs a service or any maintenance work, we will book it in with one of our approved local garages.

Now the second option, is main dealer servicing, and this does come at an additional cost.

But what it means is that your car will always be booked in to the nearest manufacturer's dealership or service centre.
So once you’ve made all your selections, you can then click calculate quote and this will bring through the financial breakdown for you.

So here we have the live quote breakdown, which we've actually taken from the system today.

And it's based on a 40 year old driver, a 20% taxpayer living in the BN1 postcode area.

So we go to the Nissan Leaf, and this is definitely one of our more popular entry level model, EVs.

So let's just work through the quotes and we can see how we arrive at the net amount for you.

For a moment then I just want everyone to ignore the £353 highlighted in green at the top.

As this isn't the amount that you'll see on your payslip, which is going to start a bit further down where it says the monthly gross amounts, and that shows at £538.

Now, that will be the amount that you see on your payslip.

Now, as the amount is pre-tax, we are saying that incur income tax saving of £97 and a national insurance saving of £65.

Below that we have included the pension contribution saving, which is also taken into consideration at £54.

Then below that we've got the benefit in-kind as remember it's tax efficient scheme and not tax neutral and it is a taxable benefit. For this particular quote. it's an added amount of £10. And then if we calculate that together, it brings us to the monthly effects on your take home net pay at £333.

Now just moving down through the quote for complete transparency, we can see the net amounts in line with the benefit in kind rates, along with a disclaimer and the link for further information.

So if we just look across to the third column, which is 2025 to 2026, we can see that it increases slightly in line with the benefit in-kind increase of 1% that's due in that year.

There's also just a link highlighted in red saying find out more here.

That will take you through to a page, which is basically an A to Z of everything to do with benefit in kind.

And any question you can think of, there is generally an answer on there as well.

So I do recommend just clicking on that and having a good read through that page.
Below that we've got the option to adjust the contract term and mileage and then if we drop to the very bottom we can view the access mileage rate and also open up the terms and conditions.

There are four key stages when you order. The first one, when you have read and signed your document, that you’re confirming you're happy to order the vehicle.

That will then raise the case with our purchasing team who will raise a contract hire schedule across to your employer.

Your employer will then check your eligibility, that all your criteria meets that and they will approve it and your order will be placed.

Third, once you have all the confirmation emails through, you will also receive an email requesting you to do a license check.

So that is something to keep your eye out for because we won't deliver the vehicle unless you've completed that.

And then finally Tusker will keep you updated on your order.

So your first port of call will always be the driver home page. If you click in the my car tab and that will keep you updated as to what stage it's actually at.

But there's also an order and delivery team who you can email or call for further information.

If you're looking for something, more information in depth, or if you're just concerned over anything.

If your delivery date gets pushed out by 28 days or more, there will always be a phone call from the ordering delivery team, just to discuss that with you and to let you know what the dealer and the manufacturer have advised and why that's happened and what your updated date will be.

At the end of the agreements, you have three options. The first one being you can order a brand new vehicle.

We do have a renewals team who actively make contact with our drivers six months before their end of contract date, and that is support if you want to place your order and hopefully we can factor in those lead times on the delivery of your new vehicle, will coincide with the end of contract date of the current vehicle.

Second option is that you can actually purchase the vehicle.

We can only provide a quote within the last 60 days before the end of contract date.

And that's based that's basically because we base it on the market value of the vehicle at that time.

If you early term the contract, you can also request the price to buy at that point as well.

And then finally, you don't need to renew, you don't have to purchase the car and you can simply leave the scheme and hand the car back at the end of contract.

Looping back over other responsibilities.

Now for loss of value, again, if there is damage to the car, you can either submit an insurance claim prior to the end dates and arrange a repair, or you can organise your own repair through a reputable repairer.

You can return the car damaged, but it will be charged in line with the BVRLA guidelines.

Again, excess mileage.

If you've exceeded your contract mileage, you will be charged for the number of miles over the rate quoted at the beginning of the agreements.

But you can rewrite your agreement after the first 12 months or up to six months prior to the end of the date.

So please, if you got a vehicle. Keep your eye on how you're performing mileage wise.

And then finally, for fines, if you do receive any fines or penalties whilst the vehicle is in your care, these will be recharged to you with an additional admin fee of £10 plus the VAT.

Now we get asked all the time, How do I know about special offers and stock?

How do I know when that's going to drop onto the portal?

This is where contact prefaces come in and it's entirely up to you how much contact you receive from us.

You can completely opt out. However, you can also select what you wish to receive.

And there’s a newsletter, there’s special offers, and there’s the stock vehicles on the there.

This should pop up when you first create an account. However, you can also access it under my accounts and contacts preferences, and you can also opt for which method you prefer as well, which could be email, post, phone or text.

That's really useful. So you can also opt for at the beginning and then opt out later on when you’ve placed an order.

In terms of scheme access now. To get the quotes and see the range of cars available, you can simply visit tuskercars.com/welcome/universityofsussex to log in.

Or if you're tech savvy, you can scan the QR code which is in the bottom right hand corner of the slide there.

To create the account, you will need your employee number and you can find this on your payslip and your company code will be TUOS, but that code should be available on the front screen, when you log in.

Now, if you do need helper assistance with quotes or choosing a car or some general advice, please do contact our employee engagement team.

They are fully trained in your scheme and they are super knowledgeable on the industry,
specifically around the vehicles that are available and especially with the stock vehicles at the moment.

You can email them on eet@tuskerdirect.co, but the method I would recommend is on phone call by calling 0333 400 7431.

About Tusker

Tusker have been committed to reducing emissions and moving towards sustainable transport for a long time having been a carbon neutral organisation for over 10 years.

Tusker are founding members of the EV100 (a group of organisations championing the move to zero emissions) and have multiple awards for their commitment to the environment, having offset over 200,000 tonnes of carbon through various verified carbon offsetting projects overseas and in the UK. 

More guidance

Find out more about the scheme including: 

*Subject to eligibility