Travel expense management in Ireland: how mileage, subsistence and ERR work
Four steps, start to finish. Set up your vehicles and policy once, employees log trips, managers approve, and the ERR file comes out ready for ROS, with the progressive civil service mileage bands and duration-based subsistence rates applied for you.
- Steps from set-up to the ERR file for ROS
- 4
- Steps from set-up to the ERR file for ROS
- Steps
- Exports: Excel, PDF, CSV, ERR and the audit trail
- 5
- Exports: Excel, PDF, CSV, ERR and the audit trail
- Exports
- Roles: user, company admin and a free read-only accountant
- 3
- Roles: user, company admin and a free read-only accountant
- Roles
- Record retention, audit-ready (Section 886 TCA 1997)
- 6+ yrs
- Record retention, audit-ready (Section 886 TCA 1997)
- Records
Four steps, start to finish
From user registration to Revenue-ready reporting, every part of an Irish business trip is handled in one place.
Add vehicles with engine size and fuel type, set your approval chain, and add any company-specific policy reminders.
Employees record each journey with route, purpose and duration. Rates are applied from cumulative year-to-date distance, splitting a journey that crosses a band.
Managers approve or reject with a reason. Every action is timestamped in an audit trail you can export.
Generate the ERR CSV for ROS, plus Excel, PDF and accounting exports for Xero, Sage and QuickBooks.
Weighing this up against other tools? See the comparison of six Irish expense software options. For what Revenue expects on the reporting side, read the Enhanced Reporting Requirements guide.
Spreadsheets versus automated and compliant
Stop spending time on spreadsheets and remove the compliance risk that comes with them.
The old way: spreadsheets and manual sums
- Hours spent on manual calculations and rate lookups
- Risk of calculation errors and Revenue non-compliance
- Progressive mileage bands often calculated incorrectly
- Missing documentation and audit trail concerns
- No approval workflow or expense status tracking
- Hard to stay current with rate changes
The better way: automated and compliant
- Save time with automatic calculations
- Revenue compliance with real-time validation
- The right band every time, from year-to-date km
- A complete audit trail ready for Revenue inspection
- A built-in approval workflow with status tracking
- Rates kept up to date when Revenue changes them
Build the trip: car, public transport and more
Add legs in any combination, see each one rated correctly, and watch mileage, subsistence and compliance update live.
Step by step, in detail
Everything that happens between signing up and filing with Revenue.
Create your account
Register for an account and get approved by your company admin.
- Sign up with your email and company information
- Company admin receives a notification and approves your account
- Secure password-based authentication with role-based access
- Automatic assignment to your company for data isolation
Register your vehicles
Add your business vehicles with engine details for accurate mileage calculations.
- Enter vehicle make, model, year and registration number
- Specify engine size and fuel type (petrol, diesel, hybrid, electric)
- Cars (categories A/B/C/E), motorcycles (M1–M4) and bicycles. Hybrids use their actual engine size
- The Irish Revenue engine category is set automatically
- New: set opening year-to-date km per vehicle for mid-year onboarding, so the progressive mileage bands are right from day one
- Set a primary vehicle for quick expense creation
- Multiple vehicles per user
Build the trip in legs
Record a trip as one or more legs, mixing car, motorcycle, bicycle and public transport in a single claim.
- Enter trip date, business purpose, and add legs (from / to locations)
- Google Maps: type a postcode or address and autocomplete fills the route, draws a map per leg and works out the driving distance. Toggle Avoid tolls or Shortest route and the distance and rate update live. You can always enter kilometres by hand
- New: mixed-mode trips combine car mileage and public-transport tickets in the same claim, with each leg rated separately
- Switch any leg between car, motorcycle, bicycle or public transport; different vehicles on different legs are fully supported
- New: cross-border auto-detection: add a leg outside Ireland and the trip flips to international rates (Google Maps driving distance doesn't apply across borders, so you're prompted to pick flight, ferry or train instead)
- Save frequent routes as favourites: one click pre-fills route, distance, vehicle and purpose on the next trip
- Mark overnight stays and Dublin destinations for the right subsistence rate
- Add parking, tolls and other vouched expenses with receipts
- The calculation updates live as you edit legs
Automatic calculations
The system calculates Irish Revenue compliant amounts automatically.
- Official civil service rates for mileage and subsistence applied automatically
- Annual mileage tracked per vehicle, with the progressive band worked out for each trip
- Mixed-mode trips: each leg rated on its own, car legs at the engine-category rate and public-transport legs by vouched ticket
- Domestic subsistence allowances for day trips and overnight stays
- International subsistence rates with time-based calculations and country-specific rates
- Dublin meal allowance for overnight stays
- Commute deduction for home-to-site trips under Revenue's "lesser of" rule; see how to calculate mileage
Compliance validation
A built-in compliance engine checks each claim against Irish Revenue rules.
- Business purpose validation with keyword detection
- Distance reasonableness checks and route validation
- New: a long-vehicle-distance warning flags unusually long single-leg drives before submission
- New: cross-border leg detection: non-Irish locations switch the trip to international rates and notify the approver
- Time-based allowance verification
- Documentation requirements tracking
- Risk assessment (low / medium / high) and a compliance score (0–100) for each expense
Approval workflow
A company-configurable approval process with email notifications and a full audit trail.
- Single-tier approval (default): Draft → Submitted → Approved / Rejected → Paid
- New: two-tier Manager → Finance approval on request: the manager signs off the trip, finance signs off the rates and receipts
- Separate manager and finance rejection reasons, captured on each claim
- New: owners and approvers notified by email at every stage, with the relevant context
- New: custom policy reminders (banner or popup) shown on the expense form per company
- Mark approved expenses as paid and track Revenue filing
- Edit any expense, with its status reset automatically
Reporting and analytics
Reporting for compliance, payroll and audit.
- Monthly and annual expense reports
- New: Excel (XLSX) export with typed dates, numbers and a frozen header
- PDF export for Irish Revenue compliance
- CSV export for accounting software
- ERR export for Revenue filing (Finance Act 2022, Section 897C): travel and subsistence, vouched and unvouched, plus site allowance. See the ERR guide
- New: a dedicated Audit Trail export (Excel and PDF) with the full action history for Revenue audits and internal reviews
- New: filter by approval date (for payroll runs) alongside trip date, user, status, vehicle and amount
- Status breakdown, category analysis, mileage trends and company-wide analytics for admins
Review, approve, track
Single-tier or two-tier (Manager → Finance) approval, with stage-specific rejection reasons and email notifications at every stage.
What makes us different
Purpose-built for Irish Revenue compliance.
Progressive mileage bands
Works out the right rate from annual mileage and engine category, with no lookups or manual sums.
Engine category detection
Engine categories (A/B/C/E) set from engine size and fuel type, so the correct Revenue rate is always used.
Real-time compliance
Every expense checked against Irish Revenue rules before submission, so issues are caught early.
Time-based subsistence
Domestic and international subsistence from the exact trip duration and overnight stays, including Dublin allowances.
Audit-ready reports
PDF reports with the details Revenue requires, plus 6+ years of record retention (Section 886 TCA 1997).
Multi-company and secure
Complete data isolation between companies, with role-based permissions and company-scoped access.
ERR compliance
A built-in Enhanced Reporting Requirements export for Revenue filing, categorised per Finance Act 2022.
Free accountant access
Every plan includes one free read-only accountant with full visibility of expenses, reports and compliance data.
Reports ready for Revenue
Excel, PDF, CSV, ERR and the Audit Trail export. Filter by trip or approval date and produce Revenue-ready files from one screen.
User roles and permissions
Role-based access gives every user type the right permissions and keeps data secure.
User
Individual employees managing their own travel expenses.
- Create and manage personal travel expenses
- Register and manage personal vehicles
- View personal expense history and statistics
- Submit expenses for approval
- Generate personal expense reports (PDF / CSV)
- Edit own draft expenses
Company admin
Company administrators managing their organisation's users and expenses.
- All user capabilities within their company
- Approve or reject employee expenses
- Manage company user accounts and roles
- View company-wide expense reports and analytics
- Configure company approval workflows
- Export company expense data
Accountant / practitioner
Accountants and practitioners with free read-only access to oversee client expenses and compliance.
- Read-only access to all company expenses
- View and export reports (PDF, CSV, ERR)
- View expense analytics and compliance data
- Practice dashboard with a multi-client overview
- Mark expenses as filed with Revenue
- Free: does not count against the company user limit
Where to go next
Ready to automate your travel expenses?
Stop calculating manually. Expense.ie applies the correct Irish Revenue rates, manages your records, and helps keep every claim Revenue-compliant.