<p>Glad that seems to work. By making that money a scholarship not allocated to QEE (and having your son pay taxes on it) it leaves you 4K of QEE “available” that you can take AOC on.</p>
<p>When you are doing your son’s return is there a TT question that asks how much QEE was used by the parents to claim the AOC? TaxAct does and then with that number plus all the QEE and scholarship info both on and not on the 1098T it can automatically figure out how much scholarship income the student has to report.</p>
<p>Remember to include required book/supply costs in this if you have saved the receipts.</p>
<p>Just a couple more follow-up question along these lines to be sure I’m doing this correctly on TT. </p>
<p>D2 received grant money, but about 15k less than the amount of the tuition. All of the scholarship money will go towards tuition and D2 won’t have to pay any of it towards income on her taxes. The 15k that we paid towards tuition was 10k from a 529 in D2s name (the paperwork came in her name) and 5k by me so that I can claim the AOC. </p>
<p>So after I enter the 1098 information, TT asks me if I paid the full amount in box 2. When it asks this, do I say the 15k or the full amount in box 2? Then on D2s taxes, I do what annoyingdad says in the above post, putting 5k for how much I used to claim the AOC, right? And I don’t have to do anything special about the 529 money since it didn’t go towards the AOC, right?</p>
<p>Sorry if this is dumb, my head is spinning right now and I don’t want to make a mistake.</p>
<p>Thanks!</p>
<p>^Edit: I just realized that when they ask how much tuition was actually paid, it says in parentheses to include the grant amount, so I see that I should put the amount in box 2.</p>
<p>Anyone else dealing with a college that included the payments made by a parent using 529 funds in box 5 (scholarships and grants) on their kid’s 1098-T? </p>
<p>The business office at my son’s college did “because they don’t keep records of who the owner of the funds are so the could be 3rd party payments”. I’ve now submitted more documentation than they deserve to show that I’m the owner of the funds (and therefore these are not grants, scholarships or payments from a separate party), but they are dragging their feet on correcting the 1098-T. I know I can’t double dip, but we have plenty of other qualified expences to cover the amount from the 529 disbursement. I just want to be able to claim the tuition we paid cash and loans for, fair and square.</p>
<p>We have the correct 1099-Q and itemized records for expences, but I’ll lose big bucks if I file my taxes with the 1089-T as is…</p>
<p>ColdMama -</p>
<p>Ignore whatever figures appeared on the 1098t. Use your own figures. The info reported on the 1098t may be accurate by the rules the school has to follow. However, the rules the family has to follow are completely different.</p>
<p>If you have bills, account statements, receipts, cancelled checks, a 1099Q and other source documentation to show everything, I wouldn’t worry too much about the 1098T. They are frequently incorrect. It’s frustrating when a school doesn’t do things right but you can get around it if you need to. Sounds like you have good records, so use your numbers.</p>
<p>It sounds like I shouldn’t worry about the errant 1098-T… So I guess using your own numbers doesn’t automatically trigger and audit. I file “clean”, but it would be a pain to have to deal with an audit - like I have nothing better to do with my time :-)</p>
<p>I don’t like veering from the norm where taxes are concerned either, but I filed using my own numbers for 4 years with no audit problems. </p>
<p>If I had used the 1098 numbers, the final year for taxes (spring sem of sr year), D1s school would have shown thousands of dollars in grant money and zero tuition charged, just because of the way their accounting system worked.</p>
<p>Oy. My first year filing with the AOTC. I’ve read through here and think i get it but do have some questions. </p>
<p>S’ college charges $32K for tuition/fees and $8K for room and board. He received an FA package that included several grants and left us with around $10K to pay. S took a $5k federally subsidized loan, I paid the other $5k on a monthly plan - paid around $3500 of it in calendar year 2012, the rest in January 2013. </p>
<p>Turbo Tax asks me how much we actually paid last year. I have that figure as far as what I paid myself, but am unsure as to whether loans, grants should be included and if so, all of them or just the first semester that was in 2012?</p>
<p>This is why I don’t use TT anymore. The AOC calculations are too hard with that program.</p>
<p>Print out the Bursars statement. It will show all charges and credits. The loan money went to pay part of the total bill for the fall, so yes you can use some of that along with whatever cash you chipped in toward the maximum of 4k of qualified expenses. You also can use books and materials that are required of everyone in the course syllabus (yup, we claimed those expensive required dressmaker’s shears).</p>
<p>For the AOC for 2012 you can only include amounts actually paid in 2012. So anything you paid in 2013 isn’t included. From qualified education expenses(QEE, tuition, mandatory fees and required books and supplies) you have to subtract tax free scholarships and grants.</p>
<p>The numbers you gave appear to be for the full academic year. Check through the bills or bursar account and records of payment to see what the 2012 numbers are. Was the entire loan disbursed in 2012?</p>
<p>QEE paid with loan funds are eligible for the credit. Loans aren’t free money. </p>
<p>There is a way to increase the amount that can be used for the credit by having your son report some of the scholarship/grant money as taxable but having the 2012 numbers would help us.</p>
<p>Dividing your numbers in half:</p>
<p>If $16000 was charged for 2012 for QEE and $15000 scholarships/grants were applied you only have $1000 of QEE for the credit(disregarding books and supplies since you didn’t mention them). To get to $4000 for the AOC, son would have to report $3000 of the scholarships/grants as taxable income. He still may not have to file depending on his other income.</p>
<p>Turbo Tax should ask questions about the amount of QEE the school billed, the amount of scholarships/grants(they aren’t payments you made), the amount of room and board, the amount you paid. All would pertain to 2012 amounts only.</p>
<p>Thanks happymom - sounds like between the loan and the cash we did pay over $4k in 2012. In 2013 it will be more like $8k.</p>
<p>So…assuming I take that $4k as qualified expenses, he’ll have to take the room and board portion of grants as income, correct? He does file his own return, to get a refund for his part time/summer job. This shouldn’t put him over, though.</p>
<p>What tax program do you prefer? I’ve used TaxAct and the HR Block one (or is that theirs?) but used TT more often so went back to it this year. If a different program handles this education stuff better I’ll switch.</p>
<p>OK, here’s the rundown for 2012 specifically:</p>
<p>Books: $750
Tuition $ 15,682.00
Deposit $300</p>
<p>So that’s $16,732 of eligible expenses.</p>
<p>Grants (federal, state, institutional, merit, etc) total $15,415</p>
<p>Fed loans $ 2483
Paid by me: $3281
Books $750</p>
<p>Our contribution: $6514</p>
<p>Residence Hall Double Room $ 2,055.00
Board - 225 Meal Plan $ 2,175.00</p>
<p>ineligible R&B: $4230</p>
<p>So the amount that is eligible for the credit is, it appears, $2284. (difference between what we paid and what R&B was)</p>
<p>Is that right?</p>
<p>Your numbers don’t seem to add up. You have total expenses (QEE + R&B) of 20,962 and total credits (grants plus your contributions) of 21,929 – you need to figure that out first.</p>
<p>What is eligible for the credit is QEE minus (tax-free) grants or in your case 16,732 - 15,415 = $1317</p>
<p>Or as you’ve noted, you can have your son pay taxes on some of the grant money to decrease the amount of grants you have to subtract from your QEE to get the amount eligible for the credit. But you first need to figure out why your expenses and payments don’t line up properly to figure out how much you need to do that for.</p>
<p>The deposit was in addition to tuition, not applied to tuition?</p>
<p>If so:</p>
<p>$16,732 QEE - $15,415 free money = $1,317 QEE paid by you and eligible for the AOC if your son doesn’t want to report any of the scholarships/grants.</p>
<p>If the terms of the scholarships/grants permit and you allocate $2683 toward room and board then you have $4000 of QEE paid via loans and your payments. </p>
<p>The numbers don’t add up though. Total charges = $20,962, amounts paid by scholarships/grants and you = $21,925.</p>
<p>Edit: crossposted, I’m slow</p>
<p>OHmomof2 -</p>
<p>I filed everything using the IRS’s own free fillable forms. I didn’t have the patience to deal with our family’s multiple issues that turned out to be not TT friendly.</p>
<p>Sorry - initial deposit did apply. </p>
<p>This is so annoying. My 1098T is useless, it has the entire school year figures on it, not the 2012 portion.</p>
<p>From my actual fall bill which is only for semester one, the one that was in 2012.</p>
<p>Tuition plus initial student fee of $200: $15,882
R&B $4230
Grants etc: $15,415</p>
<p>Loans: $2483
What I actually paid in 2012 from my billing statement: $3,281
books: $750 </p>
<p>So our contribution was $6514</p>
<p>But R&B was $4230</p>
<p>So $2284 was paid towards eligible expenses.</p>
<p>I could move about $1800 of the grants to cover the difference and have S pay taxes (or not, most likely) on that amount?</p>
<p>PS: TT does handle this badly. On the screen where it asks is I really did pay what the 1098T says, it lets me put in a different amount. But above that it says:</p>
<p>“Enter the amount that was paid to University for tuition and expenses even if the amount was paid by someone else, such as a parent, friend, scholarship, or fellowship.”</p>
<p>Now this suggests to me that the grants should be included here. Because his grants include state, federal and institutional grants. But do they mean only OUTSIDE scholarships?</p>
<p>$16,632 QEE - $15,415 aid = $1783 QEE paid by you. It’s a simple calculation that doesn’t involve subtracting R&B from what you paid.</p>
<p>Then if your son reports $4000-1783 and the terms of the aid allow, you have $4000 QEE covered by your payments and loan disbursements.</p>
<p>I think that TT is asking for total payments with that question. All amounts paid in any fashion. Does it later ask what R&B was, what scholarships/grants were? Then it will subtract those to get QEE for the AOC. Does it also ask how much you paid? With all that it can figure it out.</p>
<p>Edit: Just to clarify, the maximum credit is $2500 and the needed QEE paid to get that is $4000 so additional amounts paid are irrelevant to the calculation.</p>