Are you running a sole proprietorship? Good to hear, because train, tram, metro, bus, it’s all possible in your accounting. Public transportation is certainly a good choice for your accounts!
Are public transportation expenses deductible?
Definitely, and even better: they are fully (100%) allowed in your accountancy.
At least if you can prove that you use public transport for your self-employed activity. So a (train) ride to the sea for a relaxing day at the beach cannot be included in your accounting.
Do you use a public transport season ticket partly professionally and partly privately? No problem, but then this must also show from the percentage of professional use you enter in your accounting.
Is the VAT also deductible?
You can recover 100% of the VAT on your public transport season ticket. At least if it is a 100% professional purchase.
Is your professional use a bit lower? Then you simply adjust the percentage of VAT deduction.
What do I need for my accounting?
Exceptionally, you don’t need an invoice! But of course you must at least hold a document showing what you bought.
Generally, VAT authorities are very strict and you always need an invoice to recover VAT, but for public transport you exceptionally do not need an invoice.
You can enter the expense and recover VAT on the basis of a purchased (season) ticket. The purchase of your ticket includes 6% VAT which you can recover.
Is only the total amount shown on your document? Enter this amount under “Amount incl. VAT”, then make the calculation what that would mean excluding VAT by dividing by 1.06.
Conclusion
Below we summarize what you, as a sole proprietorship, should pay attention to if you want to include the cost of public transportation in your accounts:
- No invoice is required (not even to recover the 6% VAT on public transportation).
- A document is still necessary, so do enter your (season) tickets in your accounts (not just the bank statements).
- If necessary, correctly distinguish between professional and private travel.
