Claiming kilometres as a support worker

Two claims, two rulebooks

Charging a participant for your travel and claiming your car at tax time are different things. The first comes out of the participant's NDIS plan, under the NDIS pricing rules. The second is a deduction, under the ATO's rules. What you charge for travel is business income like the rest of your invoices, and your car costs for work trips are a deduction against your business income as a whole.

Charging travel to a participant's plan

Under the 2025–26 NDIS rules, a sole trader could charge travel from their usual place of work to or from the participant, or between participants, where the support item allowed it and the participant agreed in advance; the agreement between you should say what travel costs can be claimed. Travel time was claimed against the same support item as the support, as provider travel, at the rate agreed for that support or lower if agreed. Running costs went on a separate non-labour travel item: for your own car, up to $0.99 a kilometre, plus tolls and parking up to their full cost, and only on trips where the travel time itself could be charged.

For plan-managed and NDIA-managed participants, travel time was capped: 30 minutes to each participant in MMM 1–3 areas (metropolitan areas and regional centres) and 60 minutes in MMM 4–5 areas (other regional areas), going by where the participant is when the support is delivered, with no set time cap in MMM 6–7 (remote and very remote areas). MMM is the Modified Monash Model the NDIS uses to class locations. If you see several participants in one area, the travel is shared between them, with the split agreed with each in advance. Transport as part of a community participation support, such as taking the participant to an activity, worked differently: your time went on the support's own item, and the running costs on activity-based transport items.

If you're not a registered provider, you can't be paid from NDIA-managed funding at all, and self-managed participants aren't held to the price limits, so with them the travel terms are the ones you agree. These are the 2025–26 rules. The 2026–27 NDIS Pricing Schedule (effective 24 September 2026) lists maximum prices only and doesn't restate them, and the NDIA says it will shortly publish updated pricing and claiming guidance. Check that before relying on any of the above.

Which trips count on your tax return

Travel straight from one participant to the next during your working day is generally work travel. The ATO's guide for community support workers and direct carers, written for employees, treats travel between clients' homes that way, and its guidance for businesses says a home-based business can claim trips to a client's premises where you're working.

Travel between home and work is different. The ATO's guidance for employees says trips between home and a regular place of work are generally private, but not where you have shifting places of work: its example is a community support worker with no fixed place of work who drives from home to different clients' homes each day, and can claim those trips. Its guidance for businesses says that if you run a home-based business, you can claim trips between your home and other places, such as a client's premises where you're working, if the travel is for business.

Whether either applies to you as a sole trader is a question for a registered tax agent, with your diary in hand, and if the personal services income rules apply to you, they can limit what you claim (the tax deductions guide explains).

The two ways to claim a car you own or lease

Cents per kilometre: multiply your business kilometres by the ATO's rate, which is 91 cents for 2026–27 (an 89 cent base plus a one-off 2 cent increase for 2026–27 only; it was 88 cents for 2024–25 and 2025–26). You can claim up to 5,000 kilometres per car. The rate covers all your car expenses, including decline in value, registration, insurance, maintenance, repairs and fuel, so you can't claim any of them, or any other car expense, on top. You don't need receipts, but you need to be able to show that you own or lease the car and how you worked out your kilometres. A diary covers the kilometres.

Logbook: keep a logbook for at least 12 continuous weeks that represent your usual travel, then claim the business share of all your actual car costs. You'll need written evidence of those car costs, such as receipts, as well as the logbook and odometer records. A logbook lasts 5 years, as long as you keep it and keep recording odometer readings; if your work changes, you may need a new one. It's more record keeping, and it's the only way to claim for more than 5,000 business kilometres.

Whichever you choose, the ATO says you must use the same method for all claims for the same car, even if some are for a job as an employee.