If I put business signwriting on my car, does the vehicle become tax deductible?

It is often asked; “if I have business signwriting put onto my motor vehicle, does this mean I can claim a tax deduction for all of my vehicle costs?”

Wouldn’t that be nice, if you could put a small amount of advertising on your car and claim the cost of driving your kids to school or picking up the groceries! Unfortunately, the tax man doesn’t agree.

If you have business advertising put onto your motor vehicle, the actual cost of the advertising (signwriting) is tax deductible as it is directly related to deriving business income – the same as a sign out the front of a business premises. However, to claim any deduction for the motor vehicle running costs the normal rules for motor vehicle deductibility apply, where effectively it is the business nature of each trip that determines the amount that can be claimed.

So this criteria still applies:

Do you use your car for work (apart from just to and from work)? Site to site, deliveries, etc..?

Or do you use your car to transport heavy or bulky items from home to work each day because:

1) you are required to transport those tools each day, OR

2) there is no safe storage? If storage is available, deciding to take tools and equipment because you want to is not deductible