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Business Expenses | What can I add to my administration?

Which costs can I include in my administration?


Business costs according to the tax authorities

The tax authorities say the following about business costs:

You may deduct business expenses from your income. Only the costs that you incur for the business interests of your company are deductible: the business expenses. Business costs are therefore the costs that are necessary within reasonable limits for the conduct of your business and the costs that are directly related to your business.

Business costs explanation

A number of costs are clearly business-related. In addition to regular costs, there are also investments. Do you want to know what the most-mentioned business costs are? Then view this page including tools for kilometer registration, the workspace tool at home and the method of registration.

Partly business and partly private

In these situations, only the business part is deductible. With many costs, such as catering costs and travel costs, it is important that you only enter the receipts / invoices that are business-related as we cannot estimate that.

However, we will apply private corrections for, for example, mobile telephone costs or lunch and dinner costs at the end of the year. This means that you enter the entire invoice amount. A frequently asked question concerns dinner and digestion costs, which is why we discuss the coffees in the catering establishments in a separate article.

Business or private?

Some costs can be both business and private. This is often debatable. Where a Museumjaarkaart is unthinkable for one entrepreneur, this could be a explainable cost item for a freelance art history teacher. When considering whether something is business or not, try to look at the situation from the perspective of the tax inspector.

Examples of costs that are certainly not deductible according to the tax authorities are:

  • obtaining a diploma from which you significantly benefit outside the company (driving license)
  • costs related to your health (pedicure, health insurance)
  • personal care, such as clothing and hairdresser's expenses

You cannot deduct costs that are not of a business nature whatsoever from the profit.

Doubt about business character costs

There are many different business costs. Whether specific costs are business-related also varies per entrepreneur. To give you a little more clarity, we have created the following page with examples of business costs.

In 90% of the costs it is clear to us whether the character is businesslike or not. In any case, keep in mind that in the case of a book check you may be asked for an explanation, also about vouchers up to 7 years ago. In this case you remain responsible for the explanation.

Example by a Bookie Baas

QUESTION I registered my business for three occupations (Writing work, German teaching and arts). As a goal for this year, I would like to make some of my income from the arts but for now, I do not gain (that much) money with it but only invest. So, I am wondering if for this case I can also add costs as for instance for software (Adobe)?

ANSWER Because these costs are for your current and future activities, you can add these costs as business expenses as long as it is one of your true activities. You can add these costs at the category “Software costs”. Please note, while adding these costs in the webapp, that Adobe usually shifts the VAT on their invoices.

by Mari Last update: 22 Dec, 2023