Software Hosted in Germany Hosted in Germany
Secure. Fast. Reliable.  
Digital data transmission - in accordance with sect. 87c of the German Fiscal Code
Digital data transmission

 

The entire world of tax knowledge

Lohnsteuer kompakt FAQs

 


(2024) To what extent can I claim exceptional expenses?

Dieser Text bezieht sich auf die Steuererklärung 2024. Die aktuelle Version für die Steuererklärung 2025 finden Sie unter:
(2025): To what extent can I claim exceptional expenses?

Here you can enter the actual expenses. However, these will not be fully recognised, as your reasonable personal liability will be deducted. This depends on your income, marital status, and the number of children you have, and is calculated by the tax office. The reasonable personal liability is between one and seven percent of total income. In any case, you should be able to prove the relevant expenses.

If your expenses are below the reasonable personal liability, it is not worth declaring the costs in the tax return.

Care allowance:
If the care-related expenses are still higher than the care allowance after deducting the personal liability, enter your care expenses as they actually occurred. However, you must then also be able to prove individually what you spent money on. In this way, you can claim more than the care allowance.

Tip

For the tax office, it does not matter when the costs were incurred, but when you paid them. You should therefore try to consolidate several expense items into one year to increase the total expenses and thus exceed the limit of your reasonable personal liability.

Is there a large dental bill due, but not until next year? However, if you could already book other expenses under extraordinary burdens for the current year, ask your dentist for an early invoice or a partial invoice. This way, you may be able to claim all expenses that exceed the reasonable liability in the tax return for the current year.

Important

The reasonable liability is only deducted for general extraordinary burdens. Expenses listed under special extraordinary burdens remain uncut.

You can use this table to roughly calculate your reasonable personal liability:

Text reviews: To what extent can I claim exceptional expenses?

         

4.25 of 5
Number of reviews: 20

Finanztip

"Die Programme überzeugten mit einem großen Leistungsumfang, einer exakten Berechnung und allen Zusatzfunktionen. Auch Ehepaare sind hier gut aufgehoben."

Finanztip 04/2026

WirtschaftsWoche

"Der Pionier für Online-Steuererklärungen bietet Nutzern nun zusätzlich einen Import ihres digitalen Steuerbescheids und prüft auch die dort enthaltenen Daten automatisch auf Optimierungspotenzial."

WirtschaftsWoche 16/2026

Chip

"Neben einer KI-gestützten Steuerhilfe sind die Bescheidprüfung und eine effizientere digitale Kommunikation mit dem Finanzamt hinzugekommen. [...] Neben Lohnsteuerbescheinigungen kann der Cloud-Dienst nun auch Rechnungen erkennen und verarbeiten."

Chip 04/2026