Travel expenses

What you need to know before you go.

To claim a deduction for work-related expenses:

• you must have spent the money yourself and weren't reimbursed
• it must directly relate to earning your income
• you must have a record to prove it.

Note: Use the myDeductions tool in the ATO app to keep a record of your expenses throughout the year.

Travel expenses include:

• Transport expenses are deductible when you travel in the course of performing your duties. This includes the cost of driving your car, flying, catching a train, taxi or bus.
• Accommodation, meals and incidental expenses are deductible when you travel in the course of performing your duties and sleep away from home overnight.

Things to remember

You need to keep receipts – or other written evidence – for your travel expenses. There are some exceptions for expenses on accommodation, meals and incidental expenses.

You need to apportion your expenses if they are partly private in nature. If you travel on a work trip, you may not be required to apportion your costs where there is a minor private component that is merely incidental to the work.

If you travel away from home for six or more nights in a row, you need to keep travel records – such as a travel diary. This is in addition to keeping receipts for your expenses.

Receiving a travel allowance from your employer does not automatically entitle you to a deduction.

If any travel expenses are reimbursed, you can't claim a deduction for them.

You can’t claim for normal trips between home and work even if you live a long way from where you work – this is private travel.

You can’t claim accommodation, meals and incidental expenses you incur in the course of relocating or living away from home.

Examples of when you need to apportion your expenses

Record keeping exception for accommodation, meals and incidental expenses

You must always keep records of your expenses; however, you don’t have to keep all your receipts if:

• you received an allowance from your employer for the expenses
• your deduction is less than the Commissioner’s reasonable amount (the amount considered reasonable for the substantiation exception). To find this year’s amount, visit our legal database or ‘ask Alex’ on ato.gov.au.

If you claim a deduction for more than the Commissioner’s reasonable amount you need to keep receipts for all expenses, not just for the amount over the Commissioner’s reasonable amount.

Even if you are not required to keep receipts, you must be able to explain your claim and show you spent the amounts. For example, show your work diary, bank statements, the travel allowance you received and that you correctly declared your travel allowance.

Travel diary

A travel diary is a record of your travel movements and activities you undertake during your travel. It will help you work out the work-related and private elements of your trip.

If you travel away from home for six or more nights in a row, you need to keep a travel diary except in the following circumstances:

• you travel within Australia and meet the requirements for the record keeping exception, or
• you are a crew member on an international flight, and you claim a deduction for less than the allowance you received.

You should record your travel movements and activities in whatever diary/journal you use. It can be paper or electronic. It must be in English.

You must record your travel movements and activities before they end, or as soon as possible afterwards, including:

• where you were
• what you were doing
• the start and end times for the activities started and ended.

If you travel by car when you are required to sleep away from home overnight in the course of performing your duties, the journeys in your car will have to be recorded separately.

The way in which they should be recorded will depend on what method you are using to calculate your car expenses.

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