195D Exemption in respect of certain expense payments for resident relevant directors

Summary

This section exempts from income tax certain expenses of travel and subsistence of a resident non-executive director of a company. Such expenses must be incurred solely for the purpose of attendance by such a director, in his or her capacity as a director, at a relevant meeting, as defined in the section

Details

Definitions

(1) “civil servant” has the meaning assigned to it by the Civil Service Regulation Act 1956;

“company” has the same meaning as it has in section 4;

“director” has the same meaning as it has in section 770;

“relevant director”, in relation to a company, means a director who is resident in the State and is a non-executive director of that company, and whose annualised amount of the emoluments from the office for the year of assessment 2017 and for each subsequent year in which the person is a relevant director of the company (other than expenses of travel and subsistence to which this section applies) does not exceed €5,000

“relevant meeting” means a meeting attended by a relevant director in his or her capacity as a director for the purposes of the conduct of the affairs of the company;

“travel” means travel by car, motorcycle, taxi, bus, rail, or aircraft.

(2) Expense Payments

This section applies to payments made by a company to or on behalf of a relevant director of that company in respect of expenses of travel and subsistence, incurred by the relevant director, on and from 1 January 2017, solely for the purpose of attendance by him or her at a relevant meeting.

(3) Exemption

So much of a payment to which this section applies, as does not exceed the upper of any relevant rate or rates laid down from time to time by the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform in relation to the payment of expenses of travel and subsistence of a civil servant, shall be exempt from income tax and shall not be reckoned in computing income for the purposes of the Income Tax Acts. As a consequence of the income tax exemption, any such payment is also exempt from USC and PRSI.

Relevant Date: Finance Act 2021