T2200 Employment Expenses Excel - Free Template

1. Open the Instructions sheet first and read the notes on what belongs in the workbook. That tells you which costs are meant for employee expense claims and which are not.
2. Enter each expense on the Expense Log sheet as soon as you pay it. Include the date, category, description, amount, and any supporting details you need later.
3. Use consistent categories for similar items, such as mileage, office supplies, home office, or phone. That keeps the T2200 Summary clean and easier to review.
4. Check the Reference sheet before you add an item that is borderline. It is easier to stop a bad entry now than to explain it at year-end.
5. Review the T2200 Summary sheet before you prepare your tax return or send numbers to your accountant. Confirm the totals match your receipts and your employer form.
6. Save a copy at year-end and start a new workbook for the next year. That gives you a clean record for each tax year and keeps the file from becoming cluttered.

This workbook is for employees who pay work expenses themselves and need clean totals for their income tax file. A common case is a salaried worker who drives 1,200 kilometres a month for client visits, or a remote employee claiming part of home internet and desk space after a full tax year.

Bookkeepers also use it when an incorporated business has staff with signed employer forms and year-end support paperwork. If you are gathering numbers for one employee with $2,400 of mileage, $680 of supplies, and $1,100 of home office costs, a spreadsheet is faster than sorting receipts at the last minute.

Employees, managers, and bookkeepers

The template suits the person who enters the expense, the manager who signs the employer form, and the bookkeeper who checks the totals. If you are dealing with 4 employees each carrying different work costs, the log keeps each person separate instead of mixing everything into one folder.

When you reach for it during the year

You usually start using it when the spending begins, not in March. By the time you are preparing your return, the workbook already has the dates, categories, and amounts in order, which makes the T2200 package much easier to complete.

The same year-end discipline carries into a GST/HST remittance schedule, where recorded amounts are already sorted when it is time to prepare the filing.

The CRA expects you to keep supporting records long enough to back up the claim, and the practical standard is six years after the end of the tax year. That means if you claim $3,150 of eligible employee expenses for 2026, you keep the workbook, receipts, and related notes well beyond filing season.

This is not a casual list of spending. If your employer has signed a T2200, your records still need to show the amount, the purpose, and the link to employment duties, especially for mileage, home office expenses, and supplies.

Why totals matter more than rough estimates

For employee expenses, exact totals beat memory every time. A mileage claim of 850 kilometres at a documented per-kilometre rate, plus $420 in office supplies and $95 in phone charges, is defensible; a handwritten guess is not.

What belongs in the file

Keep the expense date, vendor, amount, and a short explanation for each item. If the claim is being used with a T2200 and your tax return, the paper trail should let someone follow the line from receipt to summary without guessing.

The expensive mistake is mixing personal and work costs. A phone plan that is 50% personal and 50% work cannot be claimed as 100% work, and a $1,200 annual charge becomes a $600 claim when the work use is only half.

Another common problem is missing backup for mileage or home office items. If you claim 2,000 kilometres for work but have no travel log, the entire amount can be questioned, which means wasted time and possibly a reassessment.

Bad totals create bad tax filings

When people re-enter receipts from memory, they often double count or skip items. I have seen a $780 supply claim turn into $1,280 because the same receipts were entered twice in separate months, and that kind of error is easy to catch only after the return is already filed.

Small gaps become big headaches

Missing dates, vague descriptions, and lump-sum guesses are what turn a simple claim into a cleanup job. If you wait until year-end to reconstruct 10 months of spending, expect several hours of sorting for a file that should have taken minutes each week.

Those gaps are exactly why a business expense tracker is worth keeping current throughout the year.

The easiest way to keep this workbook useful is to tie it to a fixed habit, such as every Friday afternoon or the first payroll run of the month. If you enter 8 to 10 receipts each week, the file stays current and the year-end total is already close to finished.

Make the routine hard to skip

• Copy last week’s entries if you have repeat spending like parking or phone costs.
• Use the same categories every time so your T2200 Summary does not drift.
• Keep receipts in one folder and log them the same day you pay them.

Know when a spreadsheet is no longer enough

If you are tracking several employees, multiple vehicles, or a large volume of monthly expenses, a simple workbook may become slow to manage. At that point, a dedicated expense system or accounting software may be easier than forcing one file to do everything.

For most individual claims, though, this template is the right size. It is simple enough to use weekly, and structured enough to survive the year-end review without a scramble.