Teacher’s aides, integration aides, school administration staff, lab technicians and library assistants spend their own money on the job more often than most people realise – resources for the classroom, a uniform to wash, a car used between campuses, a laptop at the kitchen table for planning. Much of it is deductible, but the ATO applies the same strict rules to education support staff as to teachers, and it has named work-related expenses as a focus area again this year.
This guide sets out what education support staff can and cannot claim for the 2025-26 return being lodged now, using the ATO’s teachers and education professionals occupation guide (the ATO does not publish a separate guide for aides, but the same rules apply), its working-from-home fixed rate page and its clothing and record-keeping rules. Every rate and threshold has been checked against those pages.
It is written for anyone employed in a school or early learning setting who is not a classroom teacher. Teachers have their own guide: tax deductions for teachers in Australia.
Key takeaways
- Three golden rules apply to every claim: you spent the money and were not reimbursed, it directly relates to earning your income, and you have a record to prove it.
- Claimable: teaching aids, stationery and classroom resources you buy for your own use; compulsory or registered uniform and its laundry; car travel between campuses or to training (not home to school); working-from-home hours at 70c; union and professional fees; phone and internet work use; relevant courses; first aid training if you are the designated first aid officer.
- Not claimable: ordinary clothes, home-to-work travel, gifts or items supplied to students, prescription glasses, your initial Working with Children Check, meals during the school day, and anything your employer paid for.
- Rates for 2025-26: 88 cents per kilometre (up to 5,000 km), 70 cents per hour working from home, $1 or 50 cents per laundry load. From 1 July 2026 the car rate is 91 cents.
- Records: receipts for everything above a $300 total, an hours log for working from home, a logbook or diary for kilometres, kept for five years.
Education support staff deductions at a glance
| Expense | Claimable? | Rule or rate |
|---|---|---|
| Teaching aids, stationery, classroom resources for your own work | Yes | Receipts; apportion any private use |
| Items or gifts for students | No | ATO: “items you supply to students for their own needs, gifts purchased for students” |
| Compulsory school uniform / registered uniform / protective clothing | Yes | Purchase and laundry; $1 or 50c per load; $150 laundry without receipts |
| Ordinary clothes worn to work | No | “even if your employer requires you to wear it” |
| Car: home to school and back | No | Private travel |
| Car: between campuses, to training, transporting students to sport | Yes | 88c/km 2025-26, 91c/km 2026-27, max 5,000 km; or logbook |
| Working from home (planning, admin, student support) | Yes | 70c per hour with a record of actual hours; equipment claimed separately |
| Laptop, tablet, desk used for work | Yes, work portion | $300 or less in full; over $300 decline in value |
| Phone and internet | Yes, work portion | Records of work use if claiming over $50 |
| Union and professional association fees | Yes | Receipts or payslip deductions |
| Courses, seminars, conferences related to your current role | Yes | Not if the course enables a new career (e.g. aide to teacher) |
| First aid course | Yes, if you are the designated first aid officer | Not if employer pays |
| Excursion and camp costs | Yes, where there is an educational benefit | Travel, accommodation and meals you pay for yourself |
| Working with Children Check (initial) | No | A cost of getting the job |
| Prescription glasses, vaccinations | No | Private; protective glasses and work-required COVID tests are different |
Source: ATO, Teachers and education professionals – income and work-related deductions; Fixed rate method; Clothing, laundry and dry-cleaning expenses; cents per kilometre method. Checked 7 October 2026.
The three rules the ATO applies to every claim
The ATO’s occupation guide opens with the rules that decide every deduction: “You must have spent the money and you weren’t reimbursed”, “The expense must directly relate to earning your income”, and “You must have a record to prove it (usually a receipt).” It adds that where an expense is for both work and private purposes, “you only claim a deduction for the work-related portion.” Allowances your employer pays – for example a first aid allowance – are income and must be declared; reimbursements are not income, and you cannot then claim the reimbursed cost.
What education support staff can claim
Classroom and office resources
“You can claim a deduction for the cost of teaching aids used for work”, and for “logbooks, diaries, cardboard and pens that you use for work”. For an integration aide that might be sensory resources, visual timetables, laminating pouches and reward charts; for an administration officer, stationery and reference books; for a lab technician, consumables the school does not supply. The line the ATO draws is between resources you use to do your job and things you give students for their own use: you “can’t claim a deduction for the cost of items you supply to students for their own needs, gifts purchased for students”. End-of-year presents and a student’s lunch are generous, not deductible.
Uniforms and laundry
Conventional clothing is out: “You can’t claim conventional clothing (including footwear) as a work-related expense, even if your employer requires you to wear it.” Deductible clothing is a compulsory uniform “that your employer strictly and consistently enforces you wear”, a non-compulsory uniform registered on the Register of Approved Occupational Clothing, protective clothing, or occupation-specific clothing. A school polo with the logo that staff must wear qualifies; the black trousers you wear with it do not. Laundry of eligible clothing is claimed at “$1 per load if it only contains clothing you wear at work” or “50c per load if you mix personal items of clothing with work clothing”, and claims of $150 or less do not need receipts but do need a calculation. Sun protection – sunglasses, hats and sunscreen – is claimable in its work-related proportion if you supervise outdoors for extended periods.
Car and travel
Travel between home and your regular school is private, however early you arrive or however much you carry. The ATO allows a claim when you drive “directly between separate jobs on the same day”, between your school and an alternative workplace for the same employer (a second campus, a professional development venue, a district office), and “to and from a sporting venue when transporting students”. Under the cents-per-kilometre method the rate is 88 cents for 2024-25 and 2025-26 and 91 cents for 2026-27, for a maximum of 5,000 work kilometres per car, with “a record to show how you calculate your work-related kilometres”. Above 5,000 km you need the logbook method. Parking and tolls on deductible trips are claimable too.
Working from home
Planning, data entry, parent communication and report preparation done at home are deductible under the ATO’s fixed rate method: 70 cents per work hour for 2024-25 and 2025-26, covering “home and mobile internet or data expenses, mobile and home phone usage expenses, electricity and gas (energy expenses) for heating, cooling and lighting, stationery and computer consumables”. You must keep “a record of the number of actual hours you work from home during the entire income year – for example, a timesheet, roster, diary or other similar document (an estimate of your hours won’t be acceptable)”, plus at least one bill for each type of running cost. The decline in value of a laptop, desk or chair is claimed on top of the rate. If you claim the fixed rate you cannot also claim phone or internet separately. See our home office deductions and laptop deduction guides.
Phone, internet, fees and subscriptions
You can claim the work-related use of your own phone and internet – calls to parents, school apps, online rostering – and “if you claim more than $50, you need to keep written evidence of the total amount you incurred for phone, data and internet and records to show your work use”. Union fees and professional association fees are deductible, as are work-related subscriptions and journals.
Training, first aid and self-education
Seminars, conferences and courses “that relate to your work” as education support staff are deductible, including travel to attend. A first aid course is deductible if you are “a designated first aid person” who needs the course “to assist in emergency work situations”, and your employer did not pay for it. Formal study follows the self-education rules: a Certificate IV in Education Support or a course in behaviour management for an aide already in the role is deductible; a Bachelor of Education undertaken to become a teacher is not, because it enables new employment. Our guide to self-education expenses explains the test, including the FEE-HELP and HECS-HELP distinction.
Excursions and camps
Costs you pay yourself to accompany students on “excursions, camps, educational and sporting trips if these trips have an educational benefit related to the curriculum or extracurricular activities” are deductible – the ATO’s example allows a teacher’s flights, camp accommodation and daily lunches on a school camp. Meals the venue provides are not an expense you incurred, and ordinary lunches during the school day are always private.
What you cannot claim
- Travel between home and your regular school.
- Conventional clothing and footwear, and the laundry of it.
- Items supplied to students and gifts for students or colleagues.
- The initial Working with Children Check or other licence needed to get the job – “you can’t claim the cost to get your initial licence, regulatory permit, cards or certificate to get a job”.
- Prescription glasses or contact lenses, “even if you need to wear them while working”, and vaccinations.
- Meals during the school day, and coffee or snacks for the staffroom.
- Anything your employer paid for or reimbursed.
- Study that qualifies you for a different occupation.
Rule of thumb
If the school would have had to buy it for you to do your job and did not, it is probably deductible. If a student takes it home, you wore it to the shops, or it got you the job in the first place, it is not.
Worked example
Gurpreet, integration aide, 2025-26
Gurpreet works four days a week at a primary school and one day at the school’s second campus 11 km away, driving from the main campus each time. Her claims: 11 km x 2 x 40 weeks = 880 km at 88 cents = $774 for car travel (recorded in a diary); $240 of sensory and visual resources and stationery used with her students; two school-logo polos ($90) and 120 work-only laundry loads at $1 = $120; 160 hours of planning and report writing at home, recorded in her phone calendar, at 70 cents = $112; a $320 Certificate IV unit on supporting students with autism; and $480 of union fees. Her total of $2,136 exceeds $300, so she keeps receipts for everything except the laundry (under $150) and the car (diary record). She does not claim the Working with Children Check she renewed, the gifts she bought her students at the end of the year, or her lunches.
Records
The ATO’s records you need to keep rules: if your total work-related claim is $300 or less you need records showing you spent the money and how you worked out the claim; above $300 you need written evidence – receipts, invoices or bank records – for all of it. Laundry of $150 or less and small expenses of $10 or less (to $200 a year) have their own exceptions. Keep everything for five years from the date you lodge, and use the myDeductions tool in the ATO app to photograph receipts and log trips and hours as you go.
Common mistakes
- Claiming home-to-school travel because you carry resources. It is still private unless the items are genuinely bulky and the school provides nowhere secure to store them.
- Claiming ordinary black trousers and shoes as “uniform”.
- Claiming gifts and items for students. Kind, but not deductible.
- Estimating working-from-home hours or copying last year’s figure. The ATO requires a record of actual hours.
- Claiming phone and internet on top of the 70c rate. They are already included.
- Claiming a teaching degree while working as an aide. It enables new employment.
- Using last year’s car rate. 88 cents for 2025-26; 91 cents for 2026-27.
For the wider set of rules that apply to every employee, see our guide to work-related tax deductions.
FAQ about education support staff deductions
Can a teacher’s aide claim car expenses?
Not for the normal trip between home and school – the ATO says you “can’t claim a car expense deduction for normal trips between your home and regular place of work”. You can claim driving between two schools or campuses on the same day, between school and an alternative workplace for the same employer such as a training venue, and to a sporting venue when you transport students. Under the cents-per-kilometre method you claim 88 cents a kilometre for 2025-26 (91 cents from 1 July 2026) for up to 5,000 work kilometres a year, with a record of how you worked out the kilometres.
Can I claim my work clothes and laundry?
Only if the clothing is a compulsory uniform your employer strictly enforces, a registered non-compulsory uniform, protective clothing, or occupation-specific clothing. Ordinary clothes are not deductible “even if your employer requires you to wear it”. For eligible clothing, laundry can be claimed at $1 per load of work clothes only or 50 cents per mixed load, and up to $150 a year without receipts.
What can I claim for working from home as education support staff?
If you do planning, administration or student support work at home, you can claim the fixed rate of 70 cents per hour for 2024-25 and 2025-26, which covers electricity and gas, internet, phone, stationery and computer consumables. You need a record of the actual hours you worked from home for the whole year – a diary, roster or timesheet – because the ATO says “an estimate of your hours won’t be acceptable”. Equipment such as a laptop or desk is claimed separately.
Can I claim items I buy for students, or gifts?
No. The ATO says you cannot claim “the cost of items you supply to students for their own needs, gifts purchased for students”. You can claim teaching aids, stationery, books and classroom resources you buy for use in your own work and are not reimbursed for.
Do I need receipts for everything?
If your total work-related expense claim is $300 or less you need records showing how you worked it out but not receipts; above $300 you need written evidence for all of it. Laundry up to $150 and phone and internet claims up to $50 have their own light-touch rules. Keep everything for five years from the date you lodge – the ATO app’s myDeductions tool is the simplest way.
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Education support roles are often part-time or term-time, which makes small deductions matter more and record-keeping easier to let slide. Nanak Accountants prepares returns for school and early learning staff across Australia and will check your claims against the ATO’s current occupation guidance before lodging. Call 1300 626 258 or contact us to book.
This article is general information only and is not personal tax advice. Deduction rules, the 70 cent fixed rate, cents-per-kilometre rates, laundry rates and record-keeping thresholds were checked against the ATO’s teachers and education professionals guide and related ATO pages on 7 October 2026.
