Income and Corporation Taxes Act 1988

194 Other foreign travel expenses

(1) Where—

(a) travel facilities are provided for any journey to which this subsection applies and the cost of them is borne by or on behalf of the employer; or

(b) expenses are incurred out of the emoluments of any office or employment mentioned in subsection (2), (3) or (5) below on any such journey and those expenses are reimbursed by or on behalf of the employer,

there shall be allowed, in charging tax under Case I of Schedule E on the emoluments from that office or employment, a deduction of an amount equal to so much of that cost or, as the case may be, those expenses as falls to be included in those emoluments.

(2) Subsection (1) above applies where a person is absent from the United Kingdom for a continuous period of 60 days or more for the purpose of performing the duties of one or more offices or employments and applies to travel of the following descriptions between any place in the United Kingdom and the place of performance of any of those duties outside the United Kingdom, that is to say—

(a) any journey by his spouse or any child of his—

(i) accompanying him at the beginning of the period of absence; or

(ii) to visit him during that period;

(b) any return journey following a journey of a kind described in paragraph (a) above;

but that subsection does not extend to more than two outward and two return journeys by the same person in any year of assessment.

For the purposes of this subsection “child” includes a stepchild and an illegitimate child but does not include a person who is aged 18 or over at the beginning of the outward journey.

(3) Where a person holds an office or employment the duties of which are performed partly outside the United Kingdom, subsection (1) above applies, subject to subsection (4) below, to any journey by him—

(a) from any place in the United Kingdom to the place of performance of any of those duties outside the United Kingdom;

(b) from the place of performance of any of those duties outside the United Kingdom to any place in the United Kingdom.

(4) Subsection (1) does not apply by virtue of subsection (3) unless the duties concerned can only be performed outside the United Kingdom and the journey is made wholly and exclusively for the purpose—

(a) where the journey falls within subsection (3)(a), of performing the duties concerned; or

(b) where the journey falls within subsection (3)(b), of returning after performing the duties concerned.

(5) Where a person is absent from the United Kingdom for the purposes of performing the duties of one or more offices or employments, subsection (1) above applies, subject to subsection (6) below, to—

(a) any journey by him from the place of performance of any of those duties outside the United Kingdom to any place in the United Kingdom;

(b) any return journey following a journey of a kind described in paragraph (a) above.

(6) Subsection (1) does not apply by virtue of subsection (5) unless the duties concerned can only be performed outside the United Kingdom and the absence mentioned in subsection (5) was occasioned wholly and exclusively for the purpose of performing the duties concerned.

(7) For the purpose of applying this section in a case where the duties of the office or employment or (as the case may be) any of the offices or employments are performed on a vessel, in section 132(4)(b) the words from “or which” to the end shall be ignored.

(8) In such a case as is mentioned in subsection (7) above, subsection (4) above shall have effect as if “the duties concerned” in paragraphs (a) and (b) read “the duties concerned, or those duties and other duties of the office or employment”.

(9) Where apart from this subsection a deduction in respect of any cost or expenses is allowable under a provision of this section or section 193 and a deduction in respect of the same cost or expenses is also allowable under another provision of this section or section 193 or of any other enactment, a deduction in respect of the cost or expenses may be made under either, but not both, of those provisions.

(10) References in the Income Tax Acts (including any provision of this Act, but without prejudice to any express reference to subsection (1) above) to section 198 and to deductions allowable under sections 198, 199, 201 or 332 shall be construed as including a reference to subsection (1) above and to deductions allowable under that subsection.