I've been through the tax deduction threads - which are helpful - but I couldn't find an answer to that appeared to cover this question. I am an academic living in Vaud, I will be making under 120K so taxed at source on a B permit. I travel to many conferences (looks like the US at least three times this year and Shanghai plus European cities) - all is work; none are cheap. I also hold a visitorship at UCLA, where I will spend a month a year. Are these fares, hotels, car rental and conference registrations deductable? They are obviously connected to my work and reputation, but I don't earn money while doing them. It would be good to know before I start booking them (I have no aversion to paying an accountant or doing a tax return).

Many thanks in advance, all I want to know is whether I should be able to deduct them or not as it might make a difference to the amount of palm pressing I can get done .

unless you are an 'independent' researcher/academic (never met one!) or are contracted through a holding company to do the research, all the costs you describe should be paid by your employer and are not deductible on your tax return.

damn! Thanks, my employer will only pay for one a year (but expects me to attend and pay for at least 5 more) :/

an interesting academic institution that! have a word with your local (large) tax office to confirm my comment above and explain what you just mentioned. an employer 'forcing' an employee to incur additional personal expense to do there job is very questionable IMO.

You can deduct some of these. There is a section that comes up during online tax return that says something about these costs if they were not covered.

However, I simply don't believe your department chairman/boss actually ordered you to do that on your own expense. Generally in many places the policy is payment from departmental funds for one international conference, and he simply meant that if you want to attend more conferences, arrange your own money (from grants, sponsorships).

Question related...
Can you deduce the expenses of learning the local language at Migros' School?

Ie my question might be more "what can we deduce", I only know "travel to work and food expenses lunch".

thanks

I asked my accountant. He said it isn't tax deductable. Only training directly related to your job is. "directly" is of course amenable to interpretation, but even with my accountant's very flexible approach, he says local language lessons don't cut it.

Thanks,
In Vaud it appears that only the following is deductible:


¾ des frais de transport et de repas pris hors du domicile,*
¾ des primes et cotisations versées dans le cadre de la prévoyance individuelle liée OPP 3
(3ème pilier A), **
¾ des cotisations de rachat d'années d'assurance à une caisse de pensions, **
¾ de la pension alimentaire versée au conjoint divorcé ou séparé et des contributions versées
au détenteur de l'autorité parentale pour l’entretien d’enfants mineurs dont il a la garde, **
¾ de la déduction des frais de garde d'enfants âgés de moins de 14 ans révolus au 1er janvier
2011, **
¾ de la déduction pour personne à charge, **
¾ du coefficient de la commune de domicile lorsque celui-ci est égal ou inférieur à 44

Source:
http://www.vd.ch/fileadmin/user_uplo..._pdf/21571.pdf
(google translate those)...

So it's not much actually...

Tax deductions for training and further education can vary considerably from canton to canton. The canton of Zurich, for example, is rather generous in this respect. In Zurich, the language courses are deductible, if they have close relation to the actual job. (Quote from the ZH Circular Letter: "Bei Sprachkursen ist für die Abziehbarkeit der Kosten nötig, dass ein Zusammenhang zwischen der Sprachkenntnis und der ausgeübten beruflichen Tätigkeit ausgewiesen wird".)

In Zurich, the conference fees would be deductible, also costs of travel / hotel /food, provided that the conference will be qualified as training /further education. A letter from the employer could be very helpful, confirming the necessity & close relation to the job and also confirming that no costs were borne by the employer itself.

My suggestion would be to ask your employer to provide you with a letter as mentioned in my previous posting and deduct the costs. If you are not preparing the tax docs yourself - you can still do a lot on your own (prepare an excel list with all the related expenses and sort the receipts), so that the tax accountant just needs to insert the final figure

Interesting to see this topic.

Could I ask how much is the limit for Canton of Zurich if you pay some work-related education? Will this only include conference and could you share the link from the officials?

Thanks!

Max CHF4000, but obviously it's only on the part you yourself paid.

I update this topic about tax deductions to ask about "¾ de la déduction pour personne à charge".

We discussed with my colleague who was told that a "personne à charge" can not be his wife, not working.

Does anyone knows what qualifies for a "Personne a charge"?

PS: I asked the tax man by email as they are impossible to join on the phone, he sent me 2 emails, once saying "it counts" once saying "it does not counts" (no explanations given). And the description is very unclear...

Thanks