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What is this business trip worth?
2026: 73¢ per business kilometre to 5,000 km and 67¢ after, with 5/105 of the allowance recoverable as GST in BC and 13/113 in Ontario.
The CRA sets a per-kilometre rate that steps down after 5,000 km, and the allowance carries recoverable GST/HST inside it. Enter a trip and both figures appear, with the arithmetic that produced them.
Enter a trip and the allowance appears here, with the arithmetic behind it.
How it is worked out
Two rules, one after the other.
Both are applied by the same engine that runs inside the app. This page is not a separate copy of them.
The allowance — ITR 7306
73¢ for each of the first 5,000 km of business driving in the calendar year, 67¢ for each one after. Because the boundary is annual and cumulative, the rate on a trip depends on every trip before it, and one trip can be split across both rates. Add 4¢ per kilometre in the territories. CRA: automobile allowance rates · 2026.
The credit — ETA s.174
A registrant paying a reasonable per-kilometre allowance is deemed to have paid GST/HST inside it. The allowance is tax-included, so the claim is the tax fraction of it: 5/105 where only GST applies, 13/113 in Ontario,15/115 in New Brunswick, Newfoundland and Labrador, Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island. Which is why the province changes the credit and never the deduction. CRA: claim input tax credits.
What this does not account for
- The rates are for 2026. They are set each year and this page does not compute earlier years.
- The territories. Northwest Territories, Nunavut and Yukon add 4¢ per kilometre; the figure above uses the base rate.
- Actual vehicle costs. This is the per-kilometre allowance method. Claiming real fuel, insurance, repairs and capital cost allowance instead is a different calculation, and LedgerLodge does not do it either.
- Whether the allowance is reasonable. The prescribed rates are what make it so. Paying more than them, or paying a flat monthly amount, changes both the deduction and the taxable benefit.
- Whether you are registered for GST/HST. The credit assumes the corporation is a registrant. If it is not, there is no input tax credit.
Rates and rules as they stand for the 2026 tax year, checked against the CRA sources linked above, each on or since 14 September 2026. The per-kilometre rates are set annually.
Questions
About mileage and the CRA.
What is the CRA mileage rate for 2026?
73 cents per kilometre for the first 5,000 km of business driving in the calendar year, and 67 cents for every kilometre after that. The tiers are set by section 7306 of the Income Tax Regulations and reset on 1 January. In the Northwest Territories, Nunavut and Yukon each rate is 4 cents higher.
Can I claim GST or HST back on a mileage allowance?
Yes, and this is the part almost everyone misses. Under section 174 of the Excise Tax Act a registrant that pays an allowance based solely on business kilometres is deemed to have paid GST/HST inside it. The allowance is tax-included, so you claim the tax fraction: 5/105 in the GST-only provinces, 13/113 in Ontario, and 15/115 in the Atlantic HST provinces. On 5,000 km at 73¢ — an allowance of $3,650 — that is about $174 in British Columbia, recoverable every year and usually never claimed.
Does the 5,000 km boundary apply per trip or per year?
Per calendar year, cumulatively. The rate for a given trip depends on how many business kilometres you had already driven before it, which means a single trip can straddle the boundary and be paid partly at 73¢ and partly at 67¢. It also means trips have to be counted in date order — entering an old trip later changes the rate on everything after it.
What does the CRA need in a mileage log?
For each trip: the date, the destination, the reason for the trip and the kilometres driven. You also need the odometer reading at the start and end of the year for the vehicle. A log written at the time is what makes the allowance defensible; a reconstruction at year end is what gets it reduced.
Is the allowance taxable to me personally?
Not if it is reasonable, and using the prescribed per-kilometre rates is what makes it reasonable. A per-kilometre allowance at these rates is deductible to the corporation and not a taxable benefit to you. A flat monthly car allowance, by contrast, is a taxable benefit — the amount has to be based solely on the kilometres actually driven.
One trip is arithmetic. A year is bookkeeping.
The rate on every trip depends on the ones before it, and the credit only exists if the log is there to support it. LedgerLodge keeps the running total, recalculates the year when a trip arrives out of order, and puts the allowance and the credit on an export your accountant can read.