Private ruling: Work related travel expenses
Date of advice: 21 September 2016
Published: November 2016
Ruling period: Year ending 30 June 2017
Date scheme commenced: 1 July 2016

Ruling: Q1: Are you entitled to claim a deduction for your travel expenses? | A1: No.

Relevant facts and circumstances: You are employed as a Product Director for a company. You live in State X. You will travel to State Y every month to meet with the team you manage. The company does not pay the air fares for you to travel. This is an out-of-pocket expense that you pay.

Relevant legislative provisions: Income Tax Assessment Act 1997 section 8-1

Reasons for decision: Summary: Section 8-1 of the Income Tax Assessment Act 1997 (ITAA 1997) allows a deduction for all losses and outgoings to the extent to which they are incurred in gaining or producing assessable income except where the outgoings are of a capital, private or domestic nature, or relate to the earning of exempt income. In considering the deductibility of travel expenses, a distinction is made between travel to work and travel on work. It is only if the duties of the job require a taxpayer to travel that the taxpayer's expenses can be deducted. A deduction is generally not allowable for the cost of travel by an employee between home and their workplace as it is considered to be a private expense. The cost of this travel is incurred to put you in a position to perform your duties of employment, rather than in the performance of those duties. (Taxation Ruling TR 95/34 Income tax: employees carrying out itinerant work - deductions, allowances and reimbursements for transport expenses ). Lunney v. Commissioner of Taxation [1958] ALR 225; 1958 0311H HCA; 100 CLR 478; (1958) 11 ATD 404; (1958) 32 ALJR 139 introduced what is now regarded as the essential character test. This test requires that for an expense to be deductible, it must have the essential character of a business or income producing expense. The taxpayer in this case sought to deduct the cost of travelling from his home to his work. The expenses were disallowed as being private and domestic, establishing the broad principle that costs incurred because of living in one place while working in another cannot be regarded as deductible. The reasons given by the High Court were twofold. The fact that certain expenditure, such as travelling to work, must be incurred in order to be able to derive assessable income, does not necessarily mean that the expenditure is incidental and relevant to the derivation of assessable income. It is a prerequisite to the earning of assessable income rather than being incurred in the course of gaining that income. The essential character of the travel to and from work is that of a private and domestic nature, related to personal and living expenses as part of the taxpayer's choice of where to live, in choosing to live away from and what distance from work. In your case, you do not carry bulky goods for work, you are not an itinerant worker, and are not travelling between places of employment or starting work before departure. You incur travel expenses to enable you to work in a different city to where you live. This travel is incurred in order to put you in a position to perform your duties of your employment; it is not incurred in the performance of the duties of your employment. Travel is not a part of your actual work duties. For the travel to be a fundamental part of an employees work, travel must be an essential feature of an employee's duties (paragraph 22 TR 95/34). Your duties will only commence when you reach the work place where you carry out your work. You are not considered to be travelling in the performance of your duties from the moment you leave your home. The expenses you incur for part of the travel between your home and work are private in nature. Therefore, you are not entitled to a deduction for these expenses under section 8-1 of the ITAA 1997.