It is common for hospital doctors to be employed under a series of rotating contracts with different hospitals, at the beginning of their careers. A junior doctor may spend six to twelve months working at one particular hospital and then move on to another hospital to gain experience in a different medical area. This relatively short period of time at one hospital is not long enough for the doctor to relocate his home before his employment duties shift location to the next hospital, and so a great deal of travelling may be involved in just getting to work.

Many doctors in this position believe that they should be able to claim the cost of travelling to the hospital as an expense on their tax returns. The common view is that if you spend less than 24 months working in one location it is classed as a temporary site, and you can get tax relief for the travelling costs. Unfortunately this does not apply to the fixed term employment contracts which junior doctors sign with the various hospitals they work at.

Each hospital posting the doctor undertakes, is completely separate and is generally not contractually related to the other hospital-based positions. Individuals who work on fixed term contracts at one site cannot claim expenses for getting to their main place of work. So although a junior doctor may be employed for only six months, the work during that time is entirely based at one site, so the cost of home to work travel cannot be claimed for.

If the doctor has to travel between several clinics or hospital sites while he is under contract to one hospital trust, he may then be able to claim expenses for that inter-hospital travelling usually direct from the trust. When reviewing a claim for travelling expenses the Inspector of Taxes will check whether the employment contract requires the doctor to work at one hospital site or several sites.