Travel Allowance & Mobility in 2023

Travel reimbursement is an important employment benefit for many employees. After all, the costs you incur to go to work can add up considerably if you cannot walk or cycle to work. In this article, we explain the possibilities and developments regarding the travel allowance and its modern variant: the mobility budget.

Employers are not required to pay travel reimbursement. Whether you qualify for this depends on:

• Your collective labour agreement. Many collective labour agreements include agreements on travel reimbursement. If you are covered by a collective bargaining agreement, your employer must at least abide by it.
• The company regulations. Often such regulations are also laid down in the company regulations or personnel handbook.
• Your own negotiating skills. If you are not covered by a collective bargaining agreement and your employer does not have fixed regulations, you can negotiate them yourself during your job application or ask for them in the interim instead of a pay increase.

Are you a temporary worker? Then you are entitled to the same travel allowance as the permanent employees of the company where you work. If they do not receive a travel allowance, then unfortunately neither do you.

If the outcome is that you do not receive a travel allowance, you may be able to make use of the tax authorities’ public transport travel allowance. Read what the conditions are on  Belastingdienst.nl 

The amount employers are allowed to reimburse tax-free is slowly increasing slightly:

• Until 2023: €0.19 per kilometer
• From 2023: € 0.21 per kilometer
• From 2024: €0.22 per kilometer

There is no rule about the maximum travel distance you can be reimbursed. The employer determines the maximum number of kilometers to be reimbursed. For example, the first ten kilometers are often for your own account.

A mobility budget is a budget that you receive from your employer to finance your own work travel. From this flexible budget you can choose which part you use for which purpose and if there is money left over it is transferred to you as a gross payment. The mobility budget can be used for public transport, private lease, car, bicycle, e-bike, uber, cab or a combination thereof.

For kilometers actually traveled, the maximum untaxed reimbursement of currently € 0.21 per kilometer or the actual costs of public transport applies. If you do not use the entire budget, the rest is paid out gross and you pay tax on this portion.

More freedom of choice: more and more companies are choosing not to reimburse travel expenses on the basis of a fixed route and means of transport, but to make a (monthly) budget available. With this budget, the employee can decide which means of transport to use. Think bicycle, public transport, car, but also cab or shared car.

The fixed travel allowance is disappearing: previously, companies could agree a fixed monthly amount as a tax-free travel allowance with their employees. Due to a lot of working from home, the rules will be changed in 2022 and more and more employers will only reimburse actual travel. A thusiwork allowance can then be paid for the days spent working from home.

Growing focus on CO2 reduction: a growing number of companies are deciding to adopt a more sustainable policy, especially in the area of CO2 emissions. And then mobility is often a quickwin. In order to encourage employees to opt for sustainability, there are also organizations that leave a higher reimbursement for kilometers traveled by an environmentally friendly means of transport than by car.

Lease car less obvious: now that we have all experienced that a lot of face-to-face appointments can also take place online and from home, it is no longer obvious that every commercial function comes with a car. Legislation is now being drafted to ensure that from 2025 all business lease cars will be electric so this is already being addressed when entering into new contracts.

Electric bike more popular: with a regular bike, most people prefer not to cycle more than 6 kilometers to work. the advent of the electric bike has increased that distance to as much as 15 kilometers. Hence, the bicycle is increasing in popularity and more and more employers also have arrangements for a business bicycle.

Travel expense scheme as a distinctive employment benefit: in a tight labor market, employers are always looking for ways to make themselves attractive to new employees. Hence, more and more original and generous travel expense schemes and mobility budgets are being deployed. Wise, then, to prepare carefully for what’s important to you and what your travel expenses are when you enter salary negotiations now.

Sources consulted:

• cnv.nl
• loonwijzer.nl
• 8 trends op het gebied van duurzame mobiliteit
• blog mobiliteitsbudget Severs Breeman