What Records Should You Keep for Business Mileage?

The five things HMRC needs to see

For every business journey you claim, HMRC requires five pieces of information. If any of these is missing, the journey may be disallowed.

• Date: when the journey was made
• Start point: where you set off from
• Destination: where you drove to
• Total miles: the driving distance of the journey
• Business purpose: the reason for the journey

What counts as a business purpose?

The business purpose should explain why the journey was necessary for your work. Examples include: client meeting, site visit, supplier visit, training course, business errand.

Your regular commute to a fixed workplace is not a business journey — it is personal. But travel between different work locations, or to a temporary workplace, is business mileage.

How long to keep the records

HMRC requires you to keep mileage records for at least 5 years after the 31 January submission deadline. If you submit your 2025/26 return in January 2026, keep the records until January 2031.

Digital records are acceptable — you do not need paper. But the records must be complete and accurate, and you must be able to produce them if HMRC asks.

Making it easy

MileageCalendar records all five required fields automatically for every journey — whether tracked via calendar, GPS or manual entry. Your records are stored securely, searchable and exportable as a compliant report whenever you need them.