Essential rules for work time tracking during business trips

This article will answer the following questions:

• What is the definition of a business trip?
• How is the business trip time frame determined?
• How should a foreign business trip be accounted for?

A business trip is defined as the performance of specific tasks by an employee outside the employer’s registered office or outside the permanent place of work, at a time and place determined by the employer. 

A certain hallmark of a business trip is its incidentality – unlike regular employee tasks, a business trip is an exceptional, unusual and atypical event. If the trip is not incidental but constitutes one of employee’s regular duties, it probably means that we are dealing here with a mobile worker, i.e. one that works under conditions requiring constant movement. A mobile worker who performs their standard work duties is not on a business trip.

What makes up the duration of a business trip?

A business trip consists of: 

• the time needed for travelling to the destination of the trip lasting more than one day, together with the time of stay at the destination – including the employee’s leisure time during the stay at the destination that is not spent on the performance of business tasks,
• the time effectively spent on the performance of the assigned business tasks.

The duration of the business trip should be specified by the employer in the travel order, which will indicate the time frame of the employee’s business trip (including the exact date and time of departure and return, as well as the number of hours spent in domestic and foreign travel). 

Domestic trip taken at the request of an employer begins when the employee crosses the administrative borders of the city/town indicated by the employer as the place where the trip begins and ends when the employee crosses the administrative borders of the city/town indicated by the employer as the place where the trip ends.  

In the event of a foreign trip, the duration of the trip is calculated depending on the means of transport used:

• means of land transport – the duration of a foreign trip is counted from the moment of crossing the national border on the way abroad to the moment of crossing it on the way back home;
• means of air transport – the duration of a foreign trip is counted from the moment a plane takes off on its way abroad from the last airport in the country to the moment the plane lands at the first airport in the country on its way back;
• means of sea transport – the duration of a foreign trip is counted from the moment a ship (or a ferry) leaves the last Polish port to the moment the ship (or ferry) enters into the first Polish port on its way back.

A foreign business trip may include travelling to and from the border of a country or to and from an airport/port in a city/town that has been identified as the place where the business trip begins. Such domestic sections of a foreign business trip are subject to relevant law on domestic trips.

Sections of domestic travel taken before and after the start of the duration of a foreign business trip are not combined. However, non-state-budget employers may independently determine the rules for accounting for domestic sections of foreign business trips in their internal company regulations.

Working time during a business trip

Working time during a business trip includes:

• the duration of the business trip, to the extent of the employee’s normal working hours,
• the time of performing business tasks assigned by the employer.

The duration of a business trip where it exceeds the employee’s normal working hours is included in the working time if this time is spent on the performance of business tasks assigned by the employer. 

Combining business trip with leisure stay

And what if an employee would like to combine a business trip with holiday? This option is also available – the relevant regulations do not prohibit it. In such a case, at the request of an employee, the employer may agree to prolong the employee’s stay at the place of the business trip for private purposes, i.e. not related to the performance of business tasks. 

From the payroll (and tax) perspective, it should be assumed here that the business trip is over when the performance of business tasks by the employee is finished (i.e. not when the employee is back at the destination deemed the place where the business trip ends).

Naturally, determining the duration of a business trip and the related obligations is not always straightforward and may often call for an in-depth analysis. If this is indeed your case, we strongly encourage you to seek our professional assistance.