Danish deductions or limited tax liability in Denmark

Last updated 1/9/2024

If you live in Sweden and work in Denmark, you have limited tax liability in Denmark. The deductions you can make as someone with a limited tax liability are somewhat different to the deductions permitted under the cross-border rule.

If you live in Sweden and work in Denmark, you have limited tax liability in Denmark. If 75% of your total income is earned in Denmark for a period of one year, you can also choose to be taxed according to the cross-border rule. If you are taxed according to the cross-border rule, you are entitled to some further deductions.

Deductions for limited tax liability:

Personal allowance- if you have worked in Denmark for the entire year. In other cases, you can make personal allowance deduction using the so-called full-year conversion
Job allowance
Travel deductions (befordringsfradrag) - you can make deductions for travelling between your home and your regular workplace
A-kasse (unemployment insurance fund) deductions - this is for those who pay membership fees to an a-kasse, if you cannot deduct these from your Swedish declaration
Deductions for trade union membership - This applies to those who pay the membership fees to a trade union
Extra deduction for pension contributions

Basic deduction

The personal allowance is a total of DKK 49.700 (2024) and is deducted from income before municipal and state tax. You must be taxable in Denmark for one full income year to receive the full deduction. If you are liable for tax in Denmark for parts of the income year, you can choose to do a full-year conversion on your income instead, which will give you your personal allowance. The allowance amount depends on how long you have worked in Denmark. Whether it pays to do a full-year conversion or not depends on your salary.

Employment deduction and job allowance

Everyone who has a taxable salary or profit from a business automatically receives an employment deduction of 10.65%, maximum DKK 45.100 2024 (DKK 45.600 in 2023).

The job allowance is 4,5% on income over DKK 216.100 or a maximum of 2.800 DKK in 2024. (In 2023, the job allowance is 4,5% on income over DKK 208.700 or a maximum of 2.700 DKK.)

Travel deductions

When you work in Denmark, you have the right to make deductions for transport expenses covering transportation between your home and your place of work. However, this does not apply if your employer pays for your travel. Travel deductions are calculated per working day with a certain amount per kilometre. The deduction is given for all kilometres which exceed 24 kilometres. Therefore, you must travel more than 12 kilometres to your work in order to make use of travel deductions.

Travel deductions per working day (2024):

0-24 km - DKK 0/km
25-120 km - DKK 2,23/km
Over 120 km - DKK 1,12/km

Travel deductions per working day (2023):

0-24 km - DKK 0/km
25-120 km - DKK 2,19/km
Over 120 km - DKK 1,10/km

Travel deductions are calculated per kilometre and the number of working days, regardless of the means of transport and the actual expenditure. Holiday days, sickness days and days where you work from home should not be included in the calculation. In other words, only count the days you have actually travelled to your workplace in Denmark. You can also make a deduction for transportation over the Øresund Bridge. If you drive a car, the deduction DKK 50 per passage. For travel by bus or train, the deduction is DKK 8 per passage. If you travel by ferry between Helsingör and Helsingborg special rules apply.

Visit Skattestyrelsen for more info

See a short video on skat.dk describing how to make the travel deduction (subtitles in English)

Extra deductions for pension contributions

You can deduct your pension contributions. No action is required on your part as the deduction will be calculated automatically.
The deduction is calculated as a percentage of your contributions. The percentage depends on how many years away you are from reaching the state pension age.
You are also entitled to a deduction for contributions made by your employer (employer pension schemes).

See tax rates, percentages and amounts at Skattestyrelsens webpage. Sort on Pensions.

Rates on skat.dk

A-kasse (unemployment insurance fund)

Everyone who pays tax in Denmark can deduct the fees they pay to a Danish a-kasse, provided that they cannot deduct them from their Swedish declaration.

Trade union

In the same way as with the a-kasse, you can deduct trade union fees, max DKK 7.000 (6.000 in 2023) in the Danish "årsopgørelsen".

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We can help you

You are always welcome to visit our Information Center in Malmö to get help with your questions regarding working, moving or studying in Denmark.

Deductions - limited tax liability