Travel expenses for managing directors and shareholders without employment contracts.
February 7, 2019 | 25,00 EUR | answered by Steuerberater Bernd Thomas
Good day, I am employed subject to social insurance contributions by an external company and work there in the office until 11:00 in the morning. At the same time, I am the sole managing director/shareholder of my own limited liability company (UG) without a salary. I do not receive any benefits there and am not employed. This is a craft business. In the afternoons, I now drive a lot with my private car to construction sites, architects, or customers. The car is purely privately owned and not owned by the UG. Can I claim travel expenses, such as fuel receipts, as business expenses? Do I have to provide proof of the trips? Or can I deduct travel expenses in my personal income tax return at 0.30€/km? Thank you in advance for your response. Sincerely, M. Förster.
Dear inquirer,
I am happy to answer your inquiry based on the information provided in the context of an initial consultation on frag-einen.com. The response is based on the factual information you provided. Missing or incorrect information can affect the legal outcome.
You can claim travel expenses to the UG with travel expense reports. Without precise determination of vehicle costs, you can use 30 cents per kilometer driven. An approach of fuel receipts may also be possible, but this is difficult to differentiate in practice, so I would advise against it.
In your income tax return, the trips can only be claimed if you earn income from employment with the UG. This could potentially be problematic, as the tax office may consider the use of the vehicle as a hidden contribution to the UG, and therefore only a later profit distribution (under strict conditions) in this amount would be possible.
Note that contracts between you and your UG must always comply with the arm's length principle. You should therefore make written, clear, and unambiguous, legally effective agreements in advance and actually implement them accordingly.
Sincerely,
Bernd Thomas
Tax advisor
Dipl.-Kaufmann (FH) Bernd Thomas, Tax Advisor, Neustadtswall 85, 28199 Bremen, bernd.thomas@yahoo.de, VAT ID No. DE316948369, Member of the Hanseatic Chamber of Tax Advisors Bremen, Registration Number 111705, Professional Liability Insurance with R+V Allgemeine Versicherung AG, Mittlerer Pfad 24, 70499 Stuttgart, Insurance Sum: 250,000 euros for each individual claim; Annual Maximum Benefit: 1,000,000 euros (for all damages in one insurance year), the professional regulations of the StBerG apply, visible at https://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/stberg/
