Tax season is upon us. Can I deduct mileage for travel to different substitute teaching assignments? One source says that if you perform part of your prep work, job finding with your own computer, etc., then the answer is "yes". Usually a sub. will do a certain amount of work in his/her "home office" which appears to be the key word here. Thanks!
Educators can deduct $250.00 in expenses for their classroom. I always deduct that as I figure I spend at least that on pencils, paper, erasers and other school supplies that I give to students when they don't have any.
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Tax season is upon us. Can I deduct mileage for travel to different substitute teaching assignments? One source says that if you perform part of your prep work, job finding with your own computer, etc., then the answer is "yes". Usually a sub. will do a certain amount of work in his/her "home office" which appears to be the key word here. Thanks!
What source are you referring to?
I know normally you can't deduct commuting from home to work, but can deduct travel from worksite to worksite within the same working day. I'm not sure how that works for us as though, and I don't mess with it as the schools here are very close together. I do take the $250 expenses though on the taxes.
In addition to subbing, I do some independent contracting and operate a small publishing business. I have always understood that the first place you work each day becomes your commute. Therefore (thankfully I'm an early riser) I spend at least an hour every day in my home office before going anywhere else. Because the work is mostly computer-based, I can document it. (I file a Schedule C, do not simply deduct work-related expenses.)
There's an obvious difference in my situation from someone who is only subbing as an employee, so I'm not recommending taking the deduction. This would be a great question for a tax professional but I'll bet you'll get different answers depending on who you ask--partly because nearly every situation is unique. So much of this is "how much risk are you willing to take?" I've never been audited, but understand it can be quite painful. Still, there are those who say, "take the deduction--the worse that happens is you lose it in an audit and pay the resulting tax." But there could be penalties, etc.
We get reimbursed mileage one way, so you can't claim that if you reimbursed for it. However, you know you spend more than $250 on your classroom. We always use that deduction!
As Jeopardyfan pointed out, you can't deduct expenses for commuting from home to work. If you were a self-employed sub who completed a Schedule C every year, contracted your services to school districts, and spent a great deal of time at home managing your personal subbing business, you might be able to pull it off. Since you're probably employed by school districts or private substitute teacher companies, I think you're out of luck. Some employers require employees to have an office at home to take care of work-related business, but that's not really true for substitute teachers.
When I started teaching in the 70s, I sometimes had to travel from school to school. The district reimbursed me, but their payment per mile was less than what the IRS allowed. That meant that I could calculate the difference and write it off, along with certain other miscellaneous deductions. When the tax laws changed in the mid 1980s, these deductions became much harder to claim.
Jeopardyfan also correctly pointed out that you can deduct travel expenses for travel between work sites. If you want to calculate these expenses (for the days when you travel from school to school), it might be worth a try, and you can do it on IRS Form 2106. The problem, though, is that this travel is classified as a miscellaneous deduction. If the total of your miscellaneous deductions (job travel, tax prep fees, job education, union dues, safe deposit box rental, etc.) is less than 2% of your adjusted gross income, you're out of luck.
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02-26-2017, 03:42 PM
