You can deduct travel expenses if you are away from home on a temporary work assignment for your employer. If you are on an indefinite assignment, your travel expenses are generally not deductible.
Temporary Assignment
A temporary assignment is one that is expected to last, and does last less than one year, unless circumstances indicate otherwise. But a temporary assignment may turn into an indefinite assignment if circumstances change. An indefinite assignment is one that is realistically expected to last more than one year, whether or not it actually lasts that long.
Traveling Away From Home
You are considered to be traveling away from home if your duties require you to be away from the general area of your tax home substantially longer than an ordinary day’s work, and you need to sleep or rest to meet the demands of your work while you are away from home.
Tax Home
Since the definition used by the Internal Revenue Service for traveling away from home makes reference to your “tax home”, you must first determine where your tax home is located. Your tax home is generally your regular or main place of business or post of duty, including the city or general area in which your business or work is located.
Your family home may not necessarily be the same as your tax home for these purposes.
If your family home is in one location and your tax home is in another, different location, you cannot deduct the expenses of traveling between the two. But if you do not have a regular place of business, your family home may be your tax home.
If your work part of the time in the area where your family home is located, but you work the majority of the time in another location, this other location could be your main place of business, and therefore your tax home. In this case, you may be able to deduct your expenses while you are working in the area of your family home.
If you have more than one place of business or work, some of the factors to be taken into consideration in determining which is your main place of business (your tax home) include:
The total amount of time you normally spend at each location.
The level of your business activity in each location.