Chef uniforms: whites, checked pants and what isn't deductible

Few jobs split their wardrobe as cleanly at tax time as cooking does, and the split runs right through the one changeroom. Hang the checked pants beside the plain black pants and only one of them is deductible. It is not how many shifts you wear them, or how hard the venue leans on the dress code, that settles it. It comes down to whether a garment is peculiar to cooking or simply ordinary clothing you happen to have on at the pass. Land that distinction and the whole category sorts itself into two plain heaps.

Two garments, two answers

The ATO carves work clothing into a few tight buckets, and only some of them let you claim. Two of those buckets carry most of the weight for a cook. Clothing that is occupation-specific, distinctive to cooking and part of it, is deductible. Protective clothing and footwear that shields you from a genuine kitchen hazard is deductible. The rest is conventional clothing, and conventional clothing stays off the return no matter how hard the venue enforces it.

That is precisely why the checked pants clear the bar and the plain black pants do not. Nobody wears houndstooth kitchen pants down the street, so they read as occupation-specific. Plain black pants are everyday clothing that happens to match a dress code, so they read as conventional. The garment settles it, never the roster.

The whites, the pants, the toque

This is the heap you get to claim. The ATO treats the traditional chef's rig as occupation-specific clothing, distinctive to and bound up with the work of cooking, so where the spend was yours and no one paid you back, it returns to you.

Non-slip shoes and protective gear

A kitchen floor runs wet, greasy and hot, and the gear that stands between you and those hazards is deductible as protective items, holding its own place whatever the uniform situation.

It is not only the first purchase. Buying, mending and replacing this gear all count, so the repeat buys are claimable too, not just the opening pair.

The plain-black catch

Here is where sound claims quietly come apart, and it is the exact mirror of the heap above. Plain, everyday clothing is conventional clothing, and a dress code does nothing to move it.

• Plain black pants and shirts. Ordinary black trousers and a plain black top are conventional clothing, off the return even where an "all black" rule demands them and you put them on for nothing but work.
• The dress code is beside the point. The test weighs the garment and whether it is occupation-specific or protective, not whether the venue required it or you wear it only on shift.
• Ordinary shoes. Plain closed shoes worn to satisfy a dress code, with no real non-slip or protective job to do, stay private.

Put simply: if the item is distinctive to cooking, like the checked pants and the whites, or it shields you, like the non-slip shoes, it is in. If it is everyday clothing a venue happens to insist on, it is out.

Laundry

Once a garment is deductible, so is washing it, and you do not need a drawerful of receipts to prove it. The ATO takes a set per-load rate for laundering the occupation-specific clothing and protective gear that qualify, worked out by method rather than by chasing each wash.

Below a modest total the ATO waves through the laundry claim without written proof, though you still show your working: loads a week times weeks worked is what stands behind it. Dry-cleaning is claimed at its real cost, on the receipts. And the ceiling follows straight from the clothing rule. You cannot claim washing plain black pants or an everyday shirt, because a garment that was never deductible does not become so once it is in the machine.

The records behind it

Every item above rests on its record, and this category lives on small, frequent buys, the first ones to slip away.

• The receipt for the whites, the pants and the toque and any other occupation-specific gear you bought.
• The docket for the non-slip shoes and any protective item, plus the replacements once service wears them through.
• The loads-a-week basis under the laundry figure, and the receipts for any dry-cleaning.

The bottom line

Sort your kitchen wardrobe three ways: what is distinctive to cooking, what protects you, and what is just ordinary clothing. The whites, the checked pants, the toque, the neckerchief and the apron are occupation-specific and return to you, and so do the non-slip shoes keeping you on your feet on a greasy floor. The plain black pants and top do not, whatever the dress code demands, and neither does washing them. Get that split right, back out anything you were reimbursed, keep the receipts and the load count, and your clothing claim rests on what the trade honestly costs you.

General information only, not tax advice. Check the ATO or a registered tax agent for your situation.