Client works for railway company, but returns home every night. Shifts vary in length from 8 to 12 hours. Employee cannot deduct meals under 8(1)(g) as that paragraph is not for employees who return home each night. However, employee may be able to deduct meals under section 8(1)(h) as an employee can deduct meals when they when required to be away for 12 hours or more as per requirements of subsection 8(4). Question is how many meals are they entitled to claim for the 12 hour period? If they did qualify under paragraph 8(1)(g) (i.e. regularly travelled overnight) but the odd time did not travel overnight and worked 10 hours or less then they can claim 1 meal as they are expected 2 meals to be eaten at home. Further in IT73-21R9 it states the simplified method allows for 1 meal for every 4 hours. To claim 3 meals when one is working 12 hours but home every night seems like it might be viewed as unreasonable. Am curious the # of meals others are or would be claiming in these circumstances.
I don’t have any railway guys but as a general office rule for truck drivers who are employed by transport companies only …
Long haul driver who leaves home on a Monday morning and is home Friday night.
2 meals on Monday, 3 on Tuesday, 3 on Wednesday, 3 on Thursday, and 2 on Friday.
Day cab driver who leaves home in the morning, is away for 12 hours or more, and home at night.
2 meals.
Day cab driver who leaves home in the morning, is away for less than 12 hours, and home at night
1 meal.
3 meals if away from home for any 24 hour period.
Truck drivers who don’t work for transport companies have different rules.
Over the years I have sent in TL2’s and log books and haven’t ever seen an adjustment made. Of course, I don’t know if the CRA could even understand the log books. Now that ELD (Electronic Logging Device) is in effect and mandatory for Canadian truck drivers I’m not sure how these guys will make out with sending CRA logs. It’s not the easiest task for many of these guys to download their log data.
As I do a fair number of long-haul truck drivers (over 24hrs.) and some 12-15 hrs., I’ve “trained” the transport companies to send me an electronic copy of their log book every quarter… (there are 2 companies who absolutely refuse and insist the drivers are responsible to obtain such, as they claim it is “too complicated to send them”… yeah right!!!
On the other hand, training myself to decipher and catalogue the log book into days away/at home, was not easy and is a time consuming tedious task.