Tax return and 1098-T

<p>I am completing daughter's taxes online using H&R Block. She only earned $910 last year on a W-2 but received substanial grants and scholarships that far surpassed her qualified tutition and expenses. For the life of me, I can find out where to enter the scholarship amount nor qualifying deduction on her tax schedule. I know I completed it last year, but screwed up my entries and the good person at her school's financial aid office had to call and help me figure my mistakes. Thanks in advance for any help.</p>

<p>and we do not have funds to seek professional help. Wondering how much she may owe in taxes as it is. Crappy that academic scholarships are taxed and sport scholarships are not taxed</p>

<p>I have never used H&R Block but other online tax companies will ask if you are a student when collecting personal info. If she answered yes, then later on the program should ask if she received a 1098.</p>

<p>Good luck.</p>

<p>Turbotax asks the general question whether anyone was in school, then later launches into all the questions, which includes asking about 1098t's. You should try going into the help for the online program and searching for 1098T and/or 1098-T.</p>

<p>thanks..maybe I'll try turbo tax. gone all through H&R and even typed in search for 1098-T and only got info on mortgage interest.</p>

<p>I'm in the middle of using Turbotax for our taxes, and my S has a 1098. A Turbotax prompt says that it is a complex issue and there are a couple of dozen ways of doing it. They say they find the financially best way. I sure hope so!</p>

<p>Yes, TurboTax lets you enter the 1098T info</p>

<p>IRS 970 is the publication with all the information about education related taxes and credits. it is really worth taking the time to read through it and understand it so you can figure out the best approach for your own situation. I do not find that the software products give you all the options. </p>

<p>For instance scholarships and grants over the amount of tuition and fees and required books are taxable. So on most of the softwares you would end up just showing the difference between scholarships/grants and tuition/fees as taxable income for the student. Howvwe in some circumstances you may be better off making more of the scholarships/grants taxable to the student (perhaps by 'opting' to pay for a non qualified expense such as room and board with a scholarship, if it is not specified for tuition and fees) which would possibly make a parent eligible for the Hope Tax credit which might mean a bigger tax saving for the family as a whole. </p>

<p><a href="http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p970.pdf%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p970.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>Take some time to read through and figure out the best options for your own circumstances. make sure you pay attention to what is an eligible qualified education expense for each tax benefit (they vary). You can choose the benefit that is most advantageous to you. You cannot 'double dip' - ie use the same expense for more than one benefit. But if using some tuition to qualify for the Hope is a better benefit for you than using it to reduce the taxability of a scholarship you can make that choice.</p>