Work at a desk and it is easy to assume you have nothing to claim. Office, admin, finance and HR roles are the largest single group of taxpayers in the country, and their deductions are the quiet kind: the hours you put in from home, the work share of a phone you bought yourself, the course that builds on the job you already do. None of them is dramatic, which is exactly why they get skipped. Added up across a year, they are worth claiming.
The rule every claim has to pass
A deduction only holds up if three things are true at once.
Anything that does double duty, the laptop you also stream on or the home internet the whole house uses, is split, and only the work portion is yours to claim. Nail that split and the rest of your return falls into line.
Working from home
If part of your week happens at the kitchen table or a home study, the running costs are claimable. The straightforward route is the ATO's fixed-rate method, a set amount for every hour worked at home that rolls energy, phone and internet into one figure, provided you keep a genuine record of the hours as you go rather than estimating them later. Bigger items you bought for that setup, a desk, a chair or a monitor, are claimed separately for their decline in value.
Your own equipment
Gear you buy to do the job is deductible, and the only question is how quickly you claim it.
A keyboard, a headset, a desk lamp: anything costing $300 or less comes off in full the year you buy it.
A laptop or a sit-stand desk is written off gradually as it declines in value.
If the item does double duty at home, claim the work-use share rather than the whole thing.
The deductions that get missed
The overlooked ones are almost always the recurring professional costs that never feel large enough to bother with:
What you can't claim
A handful of everyday desk costs feel like part of the job but never make the cut:
- Getting to work. The commute is private, whether you drive, train or bus it, and no matter how far.
- Office clothing. A suit, business attire or "corporate" clothes are conventional clothing. With no compulsory uniform, they are not deductible.
- Coffee and lunch. Your daily coffee and the lunch you buy near the office are private, even on a busy day at your desk.
- The qualification to get in. The degree or certificate that got you hired bought your way into the role rather than helping you perform it, so it stays off the return.
Small receipts, kept
Small deductions are the first to slip away, because a $40 headset receipt or a webinar invoice is the easiest thing to misplace. The ATO wants written evidence for what you spent, a record of the hours you worked from home, and a note of how you reached any work-use percentage. For a desk job that means a scattering of quiet paperwork: the annual membership on direct debit, the course fee, the monitor you bought online, the home-office hours you are meant to log as you go.
The habit that saves you is catching each cost as it happens, rather than reassembling twelve months of small ones the night before you lodge.
You can start with the ATO's myDeductions app, which is free and captures the simple entries.
The bottom line
An office return is built from small lines, one after another, which is exactly why being organised pays. Claim your work-from-home hours, the equipment you bought yourself, your professional memberships and the self-education that fits the job you do now. Leave out the commute, the work wardrobe and the coffee. Log the costs as they land through the year, and a stack of unremarkable receipts becomes a return that matches what you genuinely spent.
See what your home-office hours, memberships and equipment are worth against your income and tax.
Related: deductions by occupation · income tax calculator. General information only, not tax advice. Check the ATO or a registered tax agent for your situation.