A suit bought for work
Not deductibleA suit is not deductible, no matter how strictly your job requires you to wear one.
There is no relief for this · Anyone
Ordinary clothing is private expenditure even when you would never wear it outside work and even when your employer or your profession requires it. The test is not whether you like the clothing or whether you would have bought it otherwise, it is whether the item is ordinary clothing capable of everyday wear. Suits, smart dresses, shirts, ties and formal shoes all fail. The line is crossed only where clothing is genuinely distinctive as a uniform or genuinely protective, which is why branded workwear and safety boots do get through.
This is the single most widely believed wrong deduction in the country. Advocates and estate agents and sales people claim suits, shoes and dry cleaning every year and it fails. A related trap: a company buying suits for directors does get a deduction for the cost as remuneration, but it then creates a taxable fringe benefit on the director, so nothing is gained and payroll was not adjusted.
No relief at all, so there is no tax reason to buy it. If the business is going to clothe people, spend the money on properly branded uniform instead, which is deductible and tax free to the wearer. That is the whole difference.
s23(a)
excluded by Salaried employees cannot deduct ordinary work costs
governed by General deduction for expenditure in producing income
Staff