Reisekostenabrechnung (travel expense claims)

1. What is Reisekostenabrechnung (travel expense claims)?

A travel expense claim records and reimburses the costs of work-related activity away from base. Activity away from base exists where someone works temporarily away from their home and away from their first place of work – the first place of work is defined in Section 9(4) EStG.

Tax law recognises four categories of cost, each with its own rules:

- Travel costs – actual costs or flat-rate amounts per kilometre. - Additional subsistence expenses – flat rates depending on time away and country travelled to; actual costs are not reimbursable within the tax-free scope here. - Accommodation costs – actual costs in Germany, abroad also at flat rates. - Incidental travel costs – parking, tolls, luggage storage, work-related calls.

Reimbursements within the limits of Section 3 nos. 13 and 16 EStG are free of tax and contributions. Anything beyond that is employment income – either taxed normally or, in part, at flat rates.

The pivot is the first place of work: journeys there are not a business trip but the commute. How it is designated therefore decides the entire claim.

Two of these points invert the usual logic of an expense report. Meals are reimbursed only at flat rates, so more receipts change nothing. And the employer *assigns* the first place of work, so the same journey can be a business trip or a commute depending on that assignment.

2. Origin and development

Until the 2014 reform of travel expense tax law there was the concept of the "regular place of work", which followed the actual centre of activity and was correspondingly prone to dispute. It was replaced by the first place of work, which the employer can assign as a matter of employment law.

That simplified the application of the law considerably and at the same time created a design option: whoever assigns determines which journeys are business trips. At the same time the subsistence flat rates were reduced from three tiers to two and the rules on maintaining a second household were recast.

3. Core principles and how it works

The first place of work as the starting point

It is assigned by the employer; where no assignment is made, statutory fallback criteria apply. Without a clear designation no clean claim is possible.

Subsistence only at flat rates

For additional subsistence expenses there are flat rates only, graded by time away. A restaurant receipt changes nothing.

Reduction where meals are provided

Where the employer, or a third party at the employer's instigation, provides a meal, the flat rate must be reduced – with its own share for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

The three-month rule

For longer-term work at the same location away from base, additional subsistence expenses cease after three months. An interruption of sufficient length restarts the period.

Receipts and records

The occasion, duration, destination and participants belong documented. The records must be retained and are examined.

4. Who is Reisekostenabrechnung (travel expense claims) relevant for?

- Businesses with field service, installation or project work – travel claims are daily business there. - Employees working away from base – for them it is about costs reimbursed and what they would otherwise bear themselves. - Payroll teams – tax-free and taxable shares must be separated and processed. - Accounting – input VAT deduction and coding hang on the same claim. - Construction businesses – collectively agreed allowances sit alongside the tax rules there.

5. How it differs from related terms

- Activity away from base and the commute – journeys to the first place of work are a private matter and are taken into account through the commuting allowance in the tax return, not through travel expenses. - Travel expenses and maintaining a second household – the latter concerns a second home at the place of work and follows its own rules. - Reimbursement and reimbursement of outlays – reimbursement of outlays covers expenses incurred for the business, travel expenses the traveller's own additional costs. - Tax flat rates and collectively agreed allowances – collectively agreed payments can be higher; the excess is then taxable employment income.

6. Variants and adaptations

- A one-day trip away from base – a subsistence flat rate only from a minimum time away. - A multi-day trip – the full flat rate for intervening days, a lower one for the days of departure and return. - A trip abroad – country-specific flat rates for subsistence and accommodation. - A meeting point and a wide area of activity – separate rules for journeys there, for instance for installation staff and forestry work. - Use of a company car – on trips in a company car the mileage rate falls away; the costs are borne by the business anyway.

7. Advantages and challenges

8. Best practices for implementation

Assign the first place of work in writing

In the employment contract or in a separate designation. Without it, statutory fallback criteria apply, which rarely produce the intended result.

Automate the meal reduction

Anyone maintaining the reduction by hand forgets it. A payroll system that asks whether meals were provided and reduces accordingly deals with the most common audit finding – and a corporate booking including breakfast produces that finding systematically.

Write a travel policy

What is reimbursed, at what level and against what evidence – a short policy spares case-by-case discussion and makes the treatment consistent.

Monitor the three-month rule

For projects with a fixed location away from base it belongs in the planning, not in a later check.

9. Tips for employers and employees

10. Conclusion

Travel expense claims are less complicated than their reputation suggests – provided three things are settled: the assignment of the first place of work, the reduction where meals are provided, and the three-month rule for longer assignments. Those three are also the most frequent findings of a payroll tax audit. The flat rates themselves change regularly and differ abroad by country; they belong looked up and maintained in the system, not remembered.

For an international group two of the three have a structural cause rather than a careless one. Central travel booking with accommodation including breakfast produces the meal reduction in every single case, so it has to be captured in the data rather than left to the traveller to declare. And a project posting of several months at a customer site runs past the three-month rule without anybody deciding anything – which turns a tax-free flat rate into taxable pay from a date nobody diarised.

A note on sources: there is no official English version of the Income Tax Act (checked on 2026-09-28); the German text is cited below and its wording governs.

Sources

• Section 9 EStG – Deductible expenses, activity away from base, first place of work (German original; no official English version) (opens in a new tab)Federal Ministry of Justice – accessed 28/09/2026
• Section 3 EStG – Tax-free income, nos. 13 and 16 (German original) (opens in a new tab)Federal Ministry of Justice – accessed 28/09/2026
• Section 4 EStG – Concept of profit in general, subsistence flat rates (German original) (opens in a new tab)Federal Ministry of Justice – accessed 28/09/2026

Related terms

• Sachbezug (benefit in kind)
• Lohnart (wage type)
• Baulohn (construction payroll)