Vermont Mileage Reimbursement 2026: Two Federal Tiers

The gap between the two figures is about fifty cents a mile, and it comes from a decision about the state's own fleet rather than from the distance. A traveler with no state vehicle reasonably available is paid 72.5 cents per mile for the first half of 2026; a traveler who had one available and used a personal vehicle instead is paid 20.5 cents.

A hundred business miles are worth more than three times as much in the first case as in the second, which is why the fleet question comes before the arithmetic. A third figure sits beside them. A lift-equipped adapted van pays 77.5 cents a mile, a rate that has stood since April 2012.

Vermont's agreement with its employees does not fix a number. Article 54 pays authorized mileage at the applicable rate the General Services Administration establishes, unless the traveler is in a state-owned or leased vehicle, and the state's travel policy says the same thing about how the full and reduced rates are set.

That tie is what produced the July change. The federal automobile rate moved to 76 cents per mile on July 1, 2026 and the reduced rate to 23.5 cents, and the agreement's reference carries both into state pay without a new Vermont instrument.

The state's own publishing has not caught up everywhere. The human resources notice still lists the January figures as current, while the labor department's chart for workers' compensation travel already shows 76 cents from July 1, so an employee who checks one state source can miss the other.

A 2027 Vermont figure needs no new agreement, because the reference is to the rate the federal government sets. When the General Services Administration moves, the state figure is the new one, on the date the federal schedule names.

The two figures behave differently. The employee rate follows the federal figure, and the adapted-van rate does not. It will stay at 77.5 cents until someone changes it.

The agreement and the travel policy bind state service, and Vermont has no statute that requires a private employer to reimburse a driving expense. A private claim follows the employer's written policy.

The state rate is a good benchmark because it is a federal rate. An employer that adopts it is adopting a figure that arrives with a date attached, and the reduced tier shows what a policy looks like when it pays less for a trip the employee chose.

• Ask whether a state-style reduced tier applies before pricing a claim at the full figure.
• Keep the trip date, because the agreement's reference moved mid-year in 2026.

The Department of Human Resources publishes these figures. State employees traveling on state business, including those in the executive branch the travel policy covers.

The full and reduced figures come from the federal rates the agreement points at, so the state rate changes when those rates do.

The adapted-van rate is the exception. It is a fixed figure that has not moved since April 2012.

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.