Business Vehicle Expenses in South Africa: Mileage Rates, Logbooks & What SARS Wants (2026)

If you use your car for work in South Africa — to see clients, run between sites, or pick up supplies — you can claim a meaningful deduction against your tax. Done right, business vehicle expenses are one of the largest deductions available to freelancers and small business owners. Done wrong, they’re a common audit trigger.

This guide explains exactly how SARS treats vehicle deductions in the 2027 year of assessment (1 March 2026 – 28 February 2027), what method to use, what your logbook must contain, and a worked example so you know what you’re working with.

How much can you actually claim?

For most freelancers, the answer is in this single number: R4,95 per business kilometre, multiplied by the number of business km you drive in the year.

That’s the SARS-prescribed rate for the 2027 year of assessment. Drive 4,000 business km over the year and your deduction is R19,800. At a 27% marginal rate, that’s roughly R5,346 less tax.

If your vehicle is more expensive than average to run (luxury car, high fuel consumption, lots of business kms), there’s a second method — actual-cost — that can produce a bigger deduction. Both methods, in detail, below.

⚠️ Rates change every March. SARS updates the prescribed rate at the start of each year of assessment. Always check the current rate on the SARS Rates per Kilometre page before filing.

The two methods, side by side

You have to pick one method per year, applied consistently across all your business travel.

Method 1: SARS prescribed rate (simple)

You claim R4,95 × business kilometres. That’s it. No receipts, no fuel slips, no service-record gathering.

Best for:

• Freelancers and small business owners with reasonable vehicle costs
• Anyone who’d rather not save receipts for every fuel fill-up and service
• Drivers of standard sedans, hatchbacks, bakkies — anything mid-range

You still need to prove the business kilometres with a logbook. The prescribed rate replaces the need to track and substantiate vehicle running costs — not the need to track business travel itself.

Method 2: Actual cost (detailed)

You add up everything your vehicle actually cost you for the year, then multiply by your business-use percentage:

Deduction = (fuel + maintenance + insurance + licence + depreciation + finance interest) × (business km ÷ total km)

Best for:

• Expensive vehicles (luxury cars, high-fuel-consumption 4×4s)
• People driving very high business kms in a costly-to-run vehicle
• Anyone willing to keep every receipt and service record

The actual-cost method requires:

• Every fuel slip
• Every service and maintenance invoice
• Insurance and licence renewal documents
• Vehicle finance statements (interest portion is deductible)
• Purchase documents for depreciation calculation

Most freelancers should use the prescribed rate. The administrative effort of the actual-cost method only pays off when your vehicle running costs exceed roughly R6/km — which means an expensive vehicle, very high mileage, or both.

What’s a SARS-compliant logbook?

This is the part that catches people. The prescribed rate sounds simple — until SARS asks for proof during a verification. Then you need a logbook, and there’s a specific list of things it must contain.

For every business trip, your logbook must capture:

1. Date of the trip
2. Odometer reading at the start (km)
3. Odometer reading at the end (km)
4. Total kilometres for that trip (business)
5. Origin (where you came from)
6. Destination (where you went)
7. Reason for the trip — the business purpose, specific enough to substantiate (“client meeting with [name/company] regarding [project]”)

You also need to record your opening and closing odometer readings for the full tax year (1 March and 28 February). These bracket your total km — business and private — so the percentage of business use can be verified.

What doesn’t count as business travel

• Home to your usual place of work and back. This is “private” commuting under SARS rules, even if you’re self-employed and your place of work is a client site you visit daily.
• Personal errands done on the way to a client. If you stop at Pick n Pay before a meeting, the km to PnP is private. The km from PnP onward to the client is business.
• School runs, gym, social trips. Obvious, but worth saying.

Common logbook mistakes

• Filling in the logbook once a month, retroactively. Audit-failure waiting. SARS expects contemporaneous records — entries made on or near the date of the trip.
• “Various business trips” as the description. Specific names, places, and reasons hold up to scrutiny. Generic descriptions don’t.
• Forgetting the odometer reading. Without start/end odometer, the logbook is incomplete and SARS can reject the claim entirely.
• Estimating instead of recording. “Approximately 30 km to the city centre” doesn’t pass. Record the actual distance from the odometer.

A worked example

Naledi is a freelance graphic designer based in Cape Town. In the 2027 year of assessment, she:

• Started the year (1 March 2026) at 47,200 km on her odometer
• Ended the year (28 February 2027) at 62,000 km
• Total km for the year: 14,800 km
• Business km from her logbook: 5,200 km
• Private km: 9,600 km

Prescribed rate method

5,200 × R4,95 = R25,740 deduction

At her marginal rate of 27%, this saves her R6,950 in tax.

Actual cost method

Her vehicle costs for the year were:

Expense	Amount
Fuel (12 months)	R28,400
Insurance	R9,600
Service + maintenance	R6,200
Licence renewal	R720
Depreciation (book value × 20%)	R32,000
Total	R76,920

Her business-use percentage is 5,200 ÷ 14,800 = 35.1%.

R76,920 × 35.1% = R27,000 deduction

The actual-cost method gives her R1,260 more deduction (~R340 more tax saved). For most freelancers, that gap doesn’t justify the admin burden of saving every receipt and depreciation calculation. Naledi would probably stick with the prescribed rate.

For someone with a R900,000 SUV, high insurance, and 12,000 business km, the calculation tilts strongly the other way — actual-cost can produce R20,000+ more deduction.

Other situations worth knowing

What if I use Uber or get a ride from a friend?

Uber receipts for business travel are deductible like any other business expense. Keep the receipt (TaxKit captures these from a screenshot or photo). They’re claimed as a regular expense, not via the vehicle deduction methods.

What about ride-share income (driving Uber yourself)?

Different situation entirely. As an Uber/Bolt driver, vehicle expenses are claimed against your driving income directly. The actual-cost method usually wins here because your business-use percentage is very high.

Travel allowance vs reimbursive travel (employees)

If you’re an employee (not freelance) and your employer pays you a travel allowance, you can use either method against the allowance — prescribed rate or actual costs.

If your employer pays you a reimbursive travel allowance (per-km payment), and the rate is at or below the SARS prescribed rate (R4,95), it’s not taxed. Above the prescribed rate, the excess is taxed.

This guide focuses on freelancers and the self-employed, where you claim the deduction directly on your tax return.

Home office + business trips

If you work from home and travel to clients, the trip from your home to the client is business travel — because your home is your principal place of work. Recording is exactly the same: odometer, distance, destination, reason.

(For more on the home office side of this, see our home office tax deduction guide.)

Audit traps that catch freelancers out

1. Claiming all kms as business. SARS uses statistical norms. If your declared business kms are an outlier for your vehicle and industry, your return gets flagged.
2. No supporting logbook. SARS asks for the logbook in roughly 1 in 15 freelancer audits. Without one, the deduction is disallowed in full.
3. Logbook contradicting other records. Bank statements showing fuel purchases on dates you have no logbook entries, or in cities your logbook doesn’t visit. These are easy mismatches for SARS to spot.
4. Claiming “round-trip” trips that don’t make geographic sense. A 200 km trip from Sandton to Sandton in the same day is a red flag.
5. Using both methods in the same year. SARS expects you to pick one and stick with it. Switching mid-year, or using prescribed for some trips and actual for others, is not allowed.

FAQ

Do I need a logbook if I claim the SARS prescribed rate?

Yes. The prescribed rate replaces the need to track running costs, but you still need to prove the business kilometres. No logbook = no claim.

Can I use a logbook app instead of a paper book?

Absolutely. SARS accepts digital logbooks as long as they capture all the required fields and entries are reasonably contemporaneous. TaxKit lets you log a trip in a single WhatsApp message — “47km to client meeting in Sandton” — and stores the entry with the date and SARS-prescribed-rate calculation done for you.

What if I forgot to keep a logbook this year?

You’ll struggle to claim. Some accountants will reconstruct from calendar entries, fuel receipts, and notes — but reconstructed logbooks are an audit risk. Start logging from today. For the past, keep claims conservative.

Can I use my partner’s car for business?

You can claim mileage on a vehicle you have authorised use of, even if it’s registered to a spouse. The logbook requirements are the same. You can’t claim depreciation or finance interest on a vehicle you don’t own (actual-cost method).

What if I buy a new car mid-year?

The prescribed rate doesn’t care — it’s per business kilometre regardless of vehicle. Under the actual-cost method, you need separate calculations for each vehicle, weighted by the period of ownership.

Does the prescribed rate cover tolls and parking?

No — those are claimed separately as actual business expenses. Keep the tolls slips and parking receipts. (TaxKit picks these up from a photo.)

TL;DR

• Most freelancers should use the SARS prescribed rate — R4,95 per business km for the 2027 year of assessment.
• You need a logbook: date, odometer start/end, distance, origin, destination, reason. Per trip.
• Opening + closing odometer for the year is required.
• Actual-cost method only wins for expensive vehicles with high business km.
• Audit-proof your records. Contemporaneous entries, specific descriptions, no estimates.

Capture every trip without thinking

The reason most freelancers under-claim vehicle expenses isn’t that they don’t drive for work — it’s that they don’t log every trip as it happens. The logbook gets started in March, peters out by May, and is missing 70% of the year’s business travel by tax season.

TaxKit lives in WhatsApp. Type “47km to client meeting in Sandton” the moment you arrive and we log the trip at the SARS rate, with the date and destination saved. At year-end, your full logbook is one click away — ready for SARS, ready for your accountant.

Drive for work? Try it free → taxkit.co.za