Alabama Mileage Reimbursement 2026: The IRS Figure by Statute

Section 36-7-22 has been in force since October 1, 1999, and it does one thing: it sets the mileage rate the state pays at the amount the Internal Revenue Code allows for income tax deductions. Alabama therefore has no mileage schedule of its own to revise. When the federal figure moves, the state figure moves with it.

The change still arrives in writing. The State Comptroller's Office sends a memorandum to agencies and chief fiscal officers with the new figure and the date it starts, which is the document a traveler or a bookkeeper cites when a claim is questioned.

The federal rate moved on July 1, 2026, so Alabama has two figures for the year and the travel date picks one. A claim that covers both halves of the year is priced at each figure separately rather than averaged across the trip.

The memorandum describes the rate as paid in lieu of actual expenses for transportation. That settles a common dispute: a tank of fuel, a service or a set of tires does not sit beside a mileage claim for the same trip, because the per-mile figure already stands in for them.

The arithmetic is one multiplication. The memorandum's own example takes 110 miles at 72.5 cents and reaches $79.75, which is the whole method: total the business miles on the claim, then multiply by the rate in force on the travel date.

Section 36-7-22 is a state travel rule. Nothing in it obliges a private employer to reimburse anything, and it sets no private rate. The policy the employer wrote decides the amount, and where that policy tracks the federal figure the trip prices at 72.5 cents per mile through June 30, 2026 and 76 cents per mile from July 1.

• Ask the employer for its policy in writing, because it is the only figure that binds a private employer.
• Keep the travel date on every line, since the rate changed during 2026.
• Leave fuel and servicing receipts out of a mileage claim when the policy pays a per-mile figure.

The Alabama State Comptroller's Office publishes these figures. People traveling in a privately owned vehicle on official state business, and the agencies that reimburse them. The section it rests on governs state travel rather than a private payroll.

The dates are travel dates, not claim dates. A trip driven in June is priced at 72.5 cents even when the claim is filed in August.

The rate follows the Internal Revenue Code by statute, so a private employer weighing its own policy has the same two federal figures in front of it: 72.5 cents per mile through June 30, 2026 and 76 cents per mile from July 1.

The IRS moved the business standard mileage rate mid-year, so a 2026 trip prices by its date. This is the benchmark an employer's rate method usually follows.

The IRS has not published a standard mileage rate for 2027. Until it does, two things decide what a trip pays: the year you drove it and the date within that year. A 2026 trip pays 72.5 cents per mile through June 30 and 76 cents per mile from July 1. Miles driven from January 1, 2027 will use whatever figure the IRS publishes next.

The next year's rate has arrived in December in each of the last nine years, between December 14 and December 31. An announcement is not always the last word. The IRS raised the 2026 figure on July 1, halfway through the year, so a 2027 claim may need two rate periods.

A state that publishes a rate for its own travelers follows its own calendar, so it can publish the next period before the IRS does. A private employer's rate changes when its own policy changes, or when the benchmark that policy follows moves. It does not change because the calendar year turns.