What is a collective point?
If there is no main place of work and the employer requires the employee to be present permanently - typically on a daily basis - at a specified location (e.g. the bus depot, the employer's premises, a car park) to start work or visit work sites from there, the employee's journeys from home to this meeting point are treated as journeys to a main place of work, i.e. only considered with the travel allowance.
The Federal Fiscal Court recently made an interesting decision on the subject of "journeys to the meeting point". According to this, if the meeting point is not typically visited on a daily basis, the journeys there can be deducted at business travel rates and not just with the travel allowance (BFH ruling of 19.4.2021, VI R 6/19).
Even if the journeys can only be deducted with the travel allowance, meal allowances and accommodation costs can still be deducted as business expenses or reimbursed tax-free. This is because you are still working away from a main place of work.
No main place of work is assumed here; only the application of the travel allowance is prescribed and tax-free employer reimbursement is excluded (BMF letter of 24.10.2014, BStBl. 2014 I p. 1412, para. 39).
