Employees can enjoy a tax exemption in any catering establishment, restaurant and home delivery establishment with the Meals benefit. In Spain, the law does not allow this benefit to be used for purchases at supermarkets.
Tax limits and exemptions
This benefit is income tax exempt for the employee. Furthermore, as it is considered remuneration in kind, it is subject to its general limits. The total amount of remuneration in kind should not exceed 30% of the employee's gross annual salary and the salary must be higher than the minimum guaranteed interprofessional wage (SMI).
These are the established tax exemption limits:
Once these limits have been exceeded, if you have more money on your Meals card, you can continue to use the benefit. However, that amount will not be exempt from income tax.
For example, if you top up the card with 230€, once the employee has spent 220€, they can continue to use the remaining 10€, but this amount will not be exempt from income tax.
More information is available in the V1035-21 binding consultation.
How to activate and set up the benefit
Follow the steps below to activate the benefit:
- Click on the “Activate benefit” button. The system will redirect you to the set-up form.
- Review and adjust the settings to choose how you want the benefit to work. These are the Meals set-up options.
- Click on the “Save and activate” button and a confirmation window will be displayed.
- Click on the “Save and activate” button in the confirmation window. The system will save the settings and activate the benefit.
Once activated, the personnel assigned to that group of employees will be able to use the Meals Benefit with the settings you have selected.
Meals set-up options
Use limit per day and time slot
It is possible to limit use in Meals to certain days of the week and to specific time slots per day. To do this, just adjust the values in the table. The default setting includes every day of the week and every time slot, so that it can be used at any time of the day, and any day of the week.
If you do not add the time slots or uncheck the box for any day, you will not be able to use the card on that particular day. Therefore, if you do not select the time slots, no person will be able to use the Meals Benefit.
💡Remember!
It is under the individual responsibility of the employee. If you have more
queries, please read the V0129-19 binding consultation.
Limit the daily use
You can limit the maximum daily amount that can be used. By default, there is no daily limit, as the platform takes into account the monthly total.
By checking this option, a text field will be displayed for you to enter the maximum daily amount. This limit does not take into account the total or partial amounts that have been covered using funds from the Company Allowance or rolled-over balance.
🎓 Example:
A company has checked this option with an amount of 15€. A company employee
pays for a 2€ coffee in the morning, and at lunchtime tries to pay for a
15€ daily specials menu. As the total amount spent in the day exceeds 15€,
the system will reject the transaction for exceeding the daily limit.
Limit the use to funds from their Company Allowance
With this option you limit the use of the Meals Benefit only to the additional amount you offer them (Company Allowance), preventing them from using their salary (Salary sacrifice).
You just need to check the box to activate it. The transactions will be rejected once the employee has used all the funds from their Company Allowance.
⚠️ Important!
If you check this box but do not deliver any amount in a wallet (Company
Allowance) at the end of each payroll cycle to be used for the Meals Benefit,
your employees will not be able to use this benefit and transactions will
be rejected.
Allow exempt limits to be rolled over
This option allows your staff to decide if they want to roll over the remaining amount up to the maximum exempt limit not used in the current month. A balance may be rolled over from their salary, the company allowance or both. The amount rolled over has no expiry date. If you have limited the use to funds from their company allowance, funds from the salary will not roll over. Here you can find out how the roll-over of amounts works.
To activate it, you just need to check the box. Once enabled, employees will be able to see the roll-over option in the Cobee app, and they will have to decide whether to use this option or not.
🎓 Example:
An employee has consumed 85€ in Meals so far this month and their
company has activated this option. This person will be able to check
the option to roll over the remaining 135€ (assuming a monthly limit
of 220€) for the following month in their Cobee app. When the payroll
report arrives, they will see that they have used 220€ in the Meals
Benefit during that month, of which 85€ corresponds to their actual use
and 135€ to their rolled-over amount. This means that the following month
this person can have up to 335€ (220€ + 135€) exempted for Meals, using
the rolled-over amount first.
Employees must comply with the roll-over requirement, while the company must comply with the other requirements (Consultations V1848-12 and V2799-07)