Sales Rep Mileage Claims SA: SARS Rules 2026

Sales Rep Mileage Claims in South Africa: SARS Rules for 2026

Mileage claims are one of the most administratively burdensome parts of managing a field sales team — and one of the most frequently audited by SARS. Whether you pay reps a travel allowance or reimburse actual business kilometres, the rules are specific and the consequences of getting them wrong fall on both the employer and the rep.

This guide covers both common approaches, the SARS requirements for each, and how GPS tracking data is changing how field teams manage mileage compliance.

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Two Common Approaches to Mileage Reimbursement

South African employers generally handle field rep travel in one of two ways:

Approach 1: Travel Allowance The employer pays the rep a fixed monthly travel allowance (e.g., R5,000/month) intended to cover business travel costs. This appears on the rep's payslip as a travel allowance.

Approach 2: Kilometre Reimbursement The employer pays the rep a per-kilometre rate for business kilometres actually driven. The rep submits a mileage claim monthly (backed by a log book) and is reimbursed accordingly.

Each approach has different tax treatment, different administrative requirements, and different risks for both parties.

The Log Book: Non-Negotiable

Regardless of which approach you use, SARS requires a detailed log book for any business mileage claim. This isn't optional — without a log book, SARS can disallow the entire claim.

What Must Be Recorded in the Log Book

For each business trip, the log book must record:

• Date of the trip
• Odometer reading at start of the trip
• Odometer reading at end of the trip
• Destination (who was visited, or the business location)
• Business purpose (what was the purpose of the visit)

Additionally, the log book should record:

• Total odometer reading at the start and end of each tax year
• Private kilometres (so business km can be calculated as the difference)

SARS has made log books available for download on eFiling, and various mobile apps now capture log book data automatically. The key is that the log book must be contemporaneous — recorded at the time of travel, not reconstructed months later from memory.

What Happens Without a Log Book

If SARS audits a rep's travel claim (or a company's travel allowance deductions) and there's no log book:

• The business mileage claim is disallowed entirely
• The rep may face a tax assessment for the travel allowance that was excluded from income
• The employer may face a PAYE assessment if the allowance wasn't taxed correctly

SARS auditors are trained to spot log books that have been filled in retrospectively — uniform handwriting, identical trip lengths, no variation in patterns.

Approach 1: Travel Allowance — Tax Treatment

When an employer pays a travel allowance, the default SARS position is that 80% of the allowance is included in the rep's taxable income for PAYE purposes.

Example: Rep receives R5,000/month travel allowance

• PAYE is calculated on R4,000 (80% of R5,000) each month
• The remaining R20% is not taxed upfront

The exception: If the rep can prove that more than 80% of travel was for business purposes (backed by a log book), then only 20% of the allowance is included in taxable income.

At year-end (on the ITR12), the rep calculates their actual business kilometres and applies the SARS fixed cost/fuel/maintenance tables to determine the deductible travel cost. If the allowable deduction exceeds the amount already excluded from income, the rep gets a further deduction. If the taxable amount was more than the actual business use justifies, additional tax may be due.

Fixed Cost, Fuel, and Maintenance Tables

For reps using the travel allowance route, SARS publishes tables that vary by the value of the vehicle. The tables specify:

• A fixed cost per year (covering capital/financing costs)
• A fuel cost per kilometre
• A maintenance cost per kilometre

These tables are updated periodically and are available on the SARS website. The applicable table is determined by the value of the vehicle at the time it was first put into use (not the current market value).

Approach 2: Kilometre Reimbursement — Tax Treatment

When an employer reimburses actual business kilometres at a per-km rate, the tax treatment depends on whether the rate is at or below the SARS prescribed rate.

For the 2024/2025 tax year, the SARS prescribed rate is R4.64 per kilometre (for up to 12,000 business kilometres per year).

If reimbursed at or below R4.64/km: No PAYE — the reimbursement is tax-free in the rep's hands (and not deductible as a business expense for the employer beyond cost, but this is neutral for employed reps)

If reimbursed above R4.64/km: The excess above R4.64/km is treated as a taxable fringe benefit — PAYE applies to the excess

Track field rep routes and mileage automatically — GPS-verified km data feeds directly into expense claims.

Practical Example: Rep Driving 2,000 km/Month for Business

Let's run through the numbers for a rep who drives 2,000 business kilometres per month:

Reimbursement approach at prescribed rate:

• 2,000 km × R4.64 = R9,280 per month tax-free
• Annual: 24,000 km × R4.64 = R111,360

Note: The prescribed rate applies to up to 12,000 business km per year for the standard reimbursement. For higher km, discuss with your tax advisor whether the fixed cost/fuel/maintenance tables apply.

Reimbursement above prescribed rate (say R6.00/km):

• Total reimbursement: 2,000 × R6.00 = R12,000
• Tax-free portion: 2,000 × R4.64 = R9,280
• Taxable fringe benefit: R12,000 – R9,280 = R2,720 per month added to taxable income
• Additional PAYE on R2,720 depends on the rep's marginal rate

For most field reps in FMCG, the prescribed rate of R4.64/km is below what it actually costs to operate a vehicle for business. Companies sometimes pay above the prescribed rate to compensate reps properly — but they need to tax the excess.

Home-to-Office: Not Claimable

One of the most common mistakes in mileage claims is including the daily commute from home to the first customer visit (and the return trip at the end of the day).

SARS's position: travel between home and a fixed place of work is private travel, not business travel. For sales reps who have a fixed office, the drive from home to office is personal.

However, for reps who work from home and have no fixed office:

• Travel from home to the first client may be claimable as business travel
• This needs to be supported by evidence that home is genuinely the base of operations

Be conservative here. SARS auditors specifically look for home-to-work travel being claimed as business mileage.

How GPS Tracking Data Supports Mileage Claims

Historically, log books were handwritten in paper notebooks — easy to reconstruct or exaggerate. GPS tracking has fundamentally changed this.

Modern field sales apps with GPS tracking automatically generate:

• Date and time of each trip
• Start and end location (which maps to customer address from your CRM)
• Distance travelled
• Route taken

This data can automatically populate a SARS-compliant log book, with:

• Business purpose inferred from which customer was visited
• Odometer start/end calculated from GPS distance data
• Automatic separation of business and personal travel (during work hours vs. outside work hours)

The benefit for employers: you can confidently reimburse reps knowing the km data is accurate and auditable. The benefit for reps: their tax position is protected with contemporaneous records.

IRP5 Implications at Year-End

At year-end, travel allowances and reimbursements appear on the IRP5 under specific codes:

• Code 3701: Travel allowance (where 80% or 20% is included in income)
• Code 3702: Reimbursive travel (km reimbursements at the prescribed rate — not included in income)
• Code 3703: Excess reimbursive travel (above the prescribed rate — included in income)

Correct coding ensures the rep's ITR12 pre-population from SARS is accurate and reduces the risk of queries or assessments.

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Summary: Key Mileage Rules for 2026

Getting mileage right protects your reps' tax position and protects the company from PAYE assessments. The investment in proper tracking tools pays for itself in compliance risk avoided.