Private ruling: Deductions (under section 8-1 of the ITAA 1997) for self-education expenses, including travel, accommodation, and meals.
Date of advice: 21 August 2025
Published: 27 October 2025
Ruling period: Income year ended XXXX

Ruling: Q1: Are travel, accommodation, and meal expenses you will incur to attend the virtual conference (the Conference) deductible under section 8-1 of the Income Tax Assessment Act 1997 ? | A1: No | Q2: Are your Conference registration fees deductible under section 8-1 of the Income Tax Assessment Act 1997 ? | A2: Yes

Relevant facts and circumstances: 1. You are an individual self-employed professional actively practising and earning assessable income. 2. You intend to attend the Conference as a delegate. 3. The Conference is delivered entirely through a virtual platform and geo-fenced to within Xkm of the nominated destination. 4. Content is professionally produced and structured, covering: • clinical medicine updates • medicolegal and compliance • financial management and practice development • professional wellbeing and mental health. 5. Content is on demand rather than during fixed hours. 6. Delegates are required to engage with a minimum of 4 hours each day of structured educational content. 7. There are no in-person networking events. 8. Engagement and progress are tracked through the virtual platform. 9. You have submitted that: • the purpose of attending the Conference is to undertake self-education directly connected to the income producing activities of a registered professional • geo-fencing ensures the travel is location-specific and tied to professional development • any private purpose (e.g. holiday) will be apportioned in line with ATO guidance in TR 2024/3. 10. In response to a request for more information, you gave us additional comments or submissions about the Conference arrangements, which we've set out in the Table. Table 1: additional information about the Conference arrangements Destination selection process • The Conference organiser conducts annual surveys to gauge delegate interest in potential locations. • The Conference organiser selects and publishes a limited list of destinations for each conference period. • Destinations are selected based on school holiday alignment, infrastructure suitability (e.g. reliable internet), and expected delegate density for meaningful cohort participation. • Delegates then select from this pre-approved list only. <The applicant listed some example destinations, which were holiday destinations.> Geofencing implementation Geo-fencing is centrally controlled by the Conference organiser. It isn't reactive or tailored to individual delegate preferences. • Access is enabled only within pre-defined Xkm zones. • The same structured, CPD-accredited content is made available across all locations during each scheduled period. • Enforcement is via geo-location verification and authentication tools. • Content can't be accessed outside the approved geo-fenced regions or beyond the conference period. Location specific professional development The applicant submits that the geo-fencing requirement ensures that CPD engagement is purposeful, place-bound, and mentally distinct from everyday obligations, because it serves to: • separate delegates from their routine environment - content can't be accessed at home or work • encourages dedicated focus - travel to a defined location reinforces intentional professional development • support measurable learning - unlike traditional events, the Conference organiser tracks actual content engagement, not just attendance • time-bound structure - content is available only during the conference window, not indefinitely. Superior accountability model The Conference organise provides a higher level of participant accountability than most traditional in-person conferences: • daily engagement tracking - minimum 4 hours per day per delegate • detailed analytics - session completion, time spent, and module progression • full audit trail - digital records of access times and activity duration • CPD verification - certificates generated only on confirmed participation. The applicant contrasts this with traditional conference arrangements, that often allow sign-in on day one with no further tracking, use paper logs with limited verification, and can't ensure actual time spent on education. Commercial structure • Registration fees cover educational content development, platform delivery, and CPD accreditation. • Delegates arrange and pay for their own travel and accommodation independently. • The Conference organiser doesn't derive revenue from travel or accommodation. • The geo-fencing system is a compliance mechanism, not a bundled travel offering.

Relevant legislative provisions: Income Tax Assessment Act 1997 Section 8-1 | Further issues for you to consider | We have limited our private ruling to the questions raised in your application. There may be related issues that you should consider, including whether any person who promotes or advertises the scheme could be liable for civil penalties under the promoter penalty rules in Division 290 of Schedule 1 to the Taxation Administration Act 1953.

Reasons for decision: Summary: Are travel, accommodation, and meal expenses you will incur to attend the geo-fenced virtual conference (the Conference) deductible under section 8-1? No Are your Conference registration fees deductible under section 8-1? Yes | Detailed Reasoning - Summary (for both Questions 1 and 2): 11. Section 8-1 relevantly allows deductions for losses or outgoings that are incurred in gaining or producing assessable income, and don't have a private or domestic nature. 12. Broadly, ATO guidance says that self-education expenses (including accommodation, travel, and meal expenses incurred while attending self-education activities) may be deductible where there's a close connection between the expense and your income-earning activities. 13. Here, we think this close connection is met for the Conference registration fees. We see a close connection between your income earning activities as a practitioner and the conference content and activities. 14. However, we don't think this close connection is met for the accommodation, travel, and meal expenses. We characterise these expenses as being incurred in pursuing holiday or recreational activities and having a private character. We think your attendance at the Conference is incidental to the overall private and recreational nature of the trip. We don't think the geo-fencing condition is enough to make the expenses deductible. 15. In the event we're wrong about this conclusion, we think: • you would need to reduce the amount to be deducted under apportionment principles to the extent the accommodation, travel, and meal expenses relate to holiday or recreational activities, and • it's possible that Part IVA would apply to deny any deduction for accommodation, travel, and meal expenses. | Detailed Reasoning - Explanation (for both Questions 1 and 2): Self-education expenses may be deductible under section 8-1 if there's a close connection between the expense and your income-earning activities, and they enable you to maintain or improve skill or knowledge you use in those activities. 16. Section 8-1 allows deductions for losses or outgoings that meet either of two 'positive' limbs and don't meet any of 4 'negative limbs. Subsection 8-1(1) has the positive limbs. You can deduct any loss or outgoing to the extent that it's incurred in gaining or producing your assessable income, or necessarily incurred in carrying on a business for that purpose. Subsection 8-1(2) has the negative limbs. The relevant one for this ruling is that you can't deduct a loss or outgoing to the extent that it's of a private or domestic nature. 17. There's ATO guidance about self-education expenses in TR 2024/3. [1] We'll summarise some general points. • To be deductible, there must be a relationship or close connection between the expenditure and your income-earning duties or activities. It isn't enough to show that there's some perceived connection, general link, or causal connection between the expenditure and producing your income. [15-16] • Your reason or motive for undertaking self-education expenses isn't determinative. In many cases, the objective relationship between the expenditure and income-earning activities will establish deductibility. [19] • Self-education expenses pass the positive limbs if either: o they enable you to maintain or improve a skill or knowledge that you exercise in your income-producing activities, or o they objectively lead to, or are likely to lead to, an increase in your income from your current income-producing activities. [22] • Apportionment is appropriate where expenses are partly incurred in income producing activities and partly for some other use, object, or purpose. [81] • Where expenses are voluntarily incurred, as self-education expenses often are, your subjective purpose or motive for incurring the expense may be a relevant factor in determining what the expense is for. [82] | Detailed Reasoning - The Conference registration fees are deductible because we see a close connection between the expense and your income earning activities.: 18. The Conference registration fees are deductible under section 8-1. We see a close connection between the expense and your income earning activities, so they pass the positive limb of section 8-1. The Conference covers clinical medicine updates, medicolegal/compliance, financial management and practice development, and professional wellbeing and mental health. Most, if not all, of these activities are directed at helping practitioners with their own practice to stay up-to date in the skills they need to maintain their professional skills or to carry on their medical practice. (See TR 2024/3 paragraph 22.) The registration fees aren't disallowed under the negative limbs as we don't consider they have a private or domestic character. The accommodation, travel, and meal expenses aren't deductible. We think these expenses are incurred in pursuing holiday or recreational activities. We don't think the geo-fencing requirement creates sufficient link to conclude these expenses are incurred in connection with your income earning activities, or aren't wholly private in nature. 19. The accommodation, travel, and meal expenses aren't deductible under section 8-1. We think these expenses are best characterised as holiday expenses and that attending the Conference is only incidental to taking the holiday. In the circumstances, we don't think the 'geo-fencing' requirement creates sufficient link to make the expenses deductible. We have observed the following points in reaching this view. • The possible destinations listed in the facts are holiday destinations. • Delegates are only required to attend conference activities virtually for 4 hours a day, and they're free to spend the rest of their time on personal activities in a holiday destination. • The facts and circumstances don't give any objectively plausible reason for the geo-fencing condition. All activities are online, the content of the conference activities isn't specific to a particular location, and the virtual attendance model doesn't appear to allow delegates to access any specialised physical facilities at the conference location that might directly relate to the training. [2] Considering these points, we characterise the expenses as being incurred in pursuing recreational or holiday activities. We think this means they don't have enough of a link to earning assessable income to pass the positive limbs in subsection 8-1(1) and would also be disallowed under subsection 8-1(2) for being of a private or domestic nature. 20. We don't think the geo-fencing condition is enough to establish the necessary link with income producing expenses. • While a delegate needs to incur the accommodation, travel, and meal expenses to attend the Conference, [3] we think the geo-fencing condition is simply a contrived design feature that requires delegates to have a holiday at the same time as attending the Conference, because we don't see any objective conference-related benefit to delegates. We don't think the causal link to deductible conference expenses shows a close enough connection to the taxpayer's income earning activities. [4] • We don't think it's enough that a delegate may assert he or she could participate, contribute, focus, or learn more effectively at the Conference because they have travelled to a geo-fenced location (for example, because they have been physically removed from work or personal commitments). We think any perceived benefit along these lines [5] would have too general and indirect a connection to income-producing activities to qualify accommodation, travel, and meal expenses for a deduction. Rather, any such benefit would be best characterised as the private benefit from taking a holiday. 21. Since we characterise the accommodation, travel, and meal expenses as being wholly incurred for a non-deductible purpose, we don't need to consider apportionment. In other words, the expenses are wholly non-deductible and aren't partly incurred for a deductible purpose. | Detailed Reasoning - Conclusions on Questions 1 and 2: 22. For these reasons, we rule that the Conference registration fees are deductible (Question 2), but the accommodation, travel, and meal expenses are wholly non-deductible (Question 1). If we're wrong in our answer to Question 1, we think any deduction for accommodation, travel, and meal expenses would be reduced (by apportionment) and potentially disallowed under Part IVA. 23. If we're wrong in our answer to Question 1, then the deduction would need to be reduced to the extent of any non-deductible purpose. In that event, we think a significant part of the accommodation, travel, and meal expenses would be attributable to private recreation or holiday activities, for similar reasons to why we consider they have a wholly private character. The delegate would need to apportion expenses on a fair and reasonable basis, considering all relevant circumstances. [6] 24. If we're wrong in our answer to Question 1, the Commissioner would also need to consider whether Part IVA would apply to disallow any available deduction for accommodation, travel, and meal expenses, even after apportionment. 25. Broadly, Part IVA disallows tax benefits obtained from schemes entered into or carried out where a relevant person had the dominant purpose of obtaining a tax benefit for the taxpayer. 26. In deciding whether Part IVA applies, the Commissioner would need to consider (among other things) whether the dominant purpose of the geo-fencing requirement is to allow a taxpayer to claim deductions for accommodation, travel, and meal expenses that could otherwise be non-deductible holiday expenses. [1] Taxation Ruling TR 2024/3 Income tax: deductibility of self-education expenses incurred by an individual. [2] For example, medical equipment for practical demonstrations of medical techniques, or specialised physical library collections with materials directly relevant to the course content. [3] In answering this question, we're assuming that the taxpayer doesn't already live in the geo-fenced conference location. If the taxpayer already happened to live in that location, then there would be no link between accommodation, travel, or meal expenses and the conference that could establish a deduction. [4] See generally TR 2024/3 at paragraph 16: it isn't enough to show a causal connection. [5] Any benefit would be subjective and difficult to verify, would depend on the personal characteristics of the delegate, and may be counterbalanced by features of the travel, accommodation, or travel destination. [6] Without meaning to be exhaustive, we think relevant circumstances informing a fair and reasonable apportionment could include a) the taxpayer's trip itinerary, b) a comparison of time and total money spent on conference activities versus other activities (personal, holiday, recreation etc) while at the geo-fenced location, c) the extent of any holiday activities occurring outside the designated conference days or periods but still as part of the overall trip, and d) whether friends and family accompanied the taxpayer. An apportionment that's reasonable for one delegate may not necessarily be appropriate for another delegate where they have different personal circumstances.

Does IVA apply to this private ruling?: Part IVA of the Income Tax Assessment Act 1936 contains anti-avoidance rules that can apply in certain circumstances where you obtain (or another taxpayer obtains) a tax benefit, imputation benefit or diverted profits tax benefit in connection with an arrangement. | If Part IVA applies, the tax benefit or imputation benefit can be cancelled (for example, by disallowing a deduction that was otherwise allowable) or you or another taxpayer could be liable to the diverted profits tax. | We haven't fully considered whether Part IVA would apply to the arrangement you asked us to rule on, or to an associated or wider arrangement of which that arrangement is part. Given our answer to Question 1 (that deductions aren't allowable for accommodation, travel, and meal expenses), there are no deductions for the accommodation, travel, and meal expenses that could give rise to a tax benefit for Part IVA purposes, so we needn't consider it further. However, if we're wrong in our answer to Question 1, then we would need to consider whether Part IVA would apply to disallow any such deductions. We think any taxpayer seeking to claim deductions for accommodation, travel, and meal expenses under this scheme, or under a similar scheme featuring a virtual conference with a geo-fenced attendance requirement, should separately consider whether Part IVA could apply to their situation. | If we needed to rule on whether Part IVA could apply, we may have needed to obtain more information from you before ruling. | For more information on Part IVA, go to our website ato.gov.au/gaar . | • section 8-1 is in the Income Tax Assessment Act 1997 | • Part IVA is in the Income Tax Assessment Act 1936.