Zone Tax Offset: Rules for Mining and FIFO Workers

What the zone tax offset is

The zone tax offset is for people who are residents of specified remote areas or isolated areas of Australia. The ATO says it helps with the higher cost of living, isolation and other factors. It does not include an offshore oil or gas rig.

The areas are either Zone A or Zone B, as specified in the ATO’s Australian zone list. Some locations are particularly isolated within a zone and are called special areas. The ATO defines a special area as one that is more than 250 km, by the shortest practicable surface route, from the nearest population centre of 2,500 or more people.

To receive the offset you need assessable income that you pay tax on, and you must lodge a tax return.

Who qualifies

The ATO bases your eligibility on your usual place of residence. To claim, that residence must be in a remote or isolated area on the ATO zone list, and it must have been your residence for 183 days or more during the income year you are claiming. For 2025-26 the ATO’s tax return instructions say the residence does not have to be continuous.

If you lived in a zone for fewer than 183 days, you may still be able to claim. The ATO sets out rules for carrying days across two income years, for example when you moved to a zone part way through a year and could not claim in that first year. One ATO example is a person who lived in a zone for 100 days in 2024-25 and 124 days in 2025-26, and could claim in 2025-26 because the total was 224 days. The exact conditions are on the ATO zone tax offset page and the T4 instructions, so read them against your own dates.

The FIFO rule

This is the part that catches mining workers out. The ATO says you are not eligible if you work in a qualifying remote or isolated area but do not live there, and it gives a fly-in fly-out worker as the example. Working in a zone for 183 days or more does not change this. It is where you live that counts.

The ATO’s own examples show how it applies:

• Lives outside a zone, works in one. The ATO gives the example of Levi, who lives in Adelaide and flies to Alice Springs for 12-day shifts. His usual place of residence is Adelaide, which is not in a prescribed zone, so he cannot claim even though he is in Alice Springs for 183 days or more. Its 2026 return instructions use a similar example: a maintenance engineer who lived in Brisbane and flew to Blackall, a Zone B location, to work in the mining industry, and so is not eligible.
• Lives in a zone, travels to a mine. The ATO gives the example of Jonte, who lives in Darwin (Zone A) and drives to Kununurra (a Zone A special area) for mining work. He works 14 days, then returns to Darwin for 16 days. He is eligible for the Zone A offset because his usual place of residence is Darwin.
• Lives overseas. The ATO also gives the example of a doctor who flies from Auckland to work in Darwin on a rotational basis. Her usual place of residence is Auckland, so she is not eligible.

The pattern across these examples is that the roster does not decide it. Your home does. If you want to compare what FIFO pays with living near site, the FIFO pay calculator and our is FIFO worth it guide cover pay and the other trade-offs.

Zone A, Zone B and special area amounts

The ATO’s 2026 supplementary tax return instructions (question T4) publish these amounts for the 2025-26 income year, for simple circumstances. The ATO zone tax offset page shows the same three figures as the base amounts.

The ATO says these amounts apply when your usual place of residence was in only one zone for at least 183 days, you cannot include a base amount for an invalid or invalid carer offset, and you either had no dependent child or student or their adjusted taxable income was too high to add a base amount.

Your amount can change in other circumstances. The ATO says the offset is made up of a fixed amount plus a percentage of a base amount, where the base amount can come from maintaining a child under 21 or a full-time student under 25, or from the invalid and invalid carer tax offset. It also says you must reduce the zone tax offset by any remote area allowance you received from Centrelink or the Department of Veterans’ Affairs. If you lived in more than one zone, worksheets in the instructions apportion the offset by days. The ATO zone or overseas forces tax offset calculator will do the working for you.

You can claim only one of the zone and overseas forces offsets. If you qualify for both, the ATO says to claim the larger.

Mining towns on the ATO zone lists

The ATO publishes its zone list by state. These mining towns appear on the pages we read. The ATO says the list is not exhaustive, so a town that is not here may still qualify, and you should check the special area criteria or contact the ATO if you are unsure. We have not listed a town unless it appeared on the ATO page.

Living in one of these towns and working at a nearby mine is the situation where the offset can apply. To see what each town is like, visit our mining towns pages, and for jobs see FIFO jobs.

How to claim

You claim the zone tax offset in your tax return. The ATO says you do not need a tax agent. For 2025-26, the supplementary tax return instructions tell you to write your offset amount at question T4, label R, without cents. The ATO says to have these details ready:

• The number of days, or the dates, your usual place of residence was in a zone during the income year.
• The adjusted taxable income of any children under 21 or full-time students under 25 you look after.
• Any remote area allowance you received from Centrelink.
• Any invalid or invalid carer tax offset you are entitled to.

The ATO also says the offset is not assessable income for Centrelink purposes, and that you must lodge any outstanding returns before you can claim. The ATO calculator is the easiest way to work out your amount if you have dependants or lived in more than one zone.

General information only

This page is general information, not tax advice. It does not take your circumstances into account. Rules and amounts change, and the ATO decides how they apply to you. Check with the ATO or a registered tax agent before you lodge, especially if your home is near a zone boundary, you split your time between two homes or you are unsure where your usual place of residence is.

Frequently asked questions

Sources

Last updated 10 October 2026. Facts on this page come from the sources below.

• ATO: Zone tax offset, last updated 8 June 2026 (read 10 October 2026)
• ATO: T4 Zone or overseas forces 2026, supplementary tax return 2026 instructions, last updated 30 May 2026 (read 10 October 2026)
• ATO: Australian zone list, last updated 1 July 2026 (read 10 October 2026)
• ATO: Australian zone list, Western Australia, last updated 1 July 2026 (read 10 October 2026)
• ATO: Australian zone list, Queensland, last updated 28 September 2026 (read 10 October 2026)

We read each page above on 10 October 2026. The ATO updates its amounts and zone lists, so check the current pages before you lodge. This page is general information, not tax advice.