Clothing and Appearance Deduction argggg

[RitaB]

Well, this one was discovered...

Quoting my post from another thread:

"This lady comes from another town, and first came to me when her preparer had a "little trouble" with IRS. (Got shut down.) Seems her previous preparer was quite a piece of work. For example, preparer listed their church contributions (and they really tithed, too) on page 2 of Sch C, and even identified them as "Church Contributions". People came from far and wide to see this fantastic preparer. "She must know what she's doing, cause she used to work FOR IRS, and I'm getting all this money back, SWEET!"

I took one look at the prior year return, and told the lady, "You WILL be audited, and I will help you if I can to get organized, but you owe tax." I went through all the glaring errors with her. Sure enough, they got audited, paid what they owed, and have been with me ever since."

The preparer described above was also a preacher. That is NOT a slam on all preachers. I have two pastors at my church that I love dearly. They are as honest as the day is long.
__________________

[Possi]

true that!

I'm not slamming preachers, either. But this man is clearly not a man of any god I know. He is dishonest and I wish I could stop him.

[wv112]

Sitting in my office desk chair 14 to 16 hours a day during tax season, I have noticed that the seat of my pants wear out very quickly....like the guy working in concrete, maybe we need to rethink this.

[taxea]

1. "Performance clothing" is not tax terminology but we all know what is meant by it. The tax jargon equivalents might be "work clothing" and "grooming".

2. I can well believe that an on air personality would have special grooming requirements such as zero facial hair and special makeup that would not apply if they were not on air personalities. In the case of the makeup it would be necessary that before going out in public the person removes the work related makeup and either does without or puts on "personal" makeup. If they wanted to try to claim expenses for the care of hair or nails I would need a written explanation of how they alter the appearance of these things before going out on the street, For example if they wear a wig on or off I would deduct the expenses of the one that they wear on air. I'd have no problem claiming such expenses but I would warn in writing that they might be lost on audit and I would disclose.

3. Safety shoes and other safety equipment I would deduct as much as the person said they had the receipts for. I don't think my seeing those receipts is necessary although I often do.

4. As a former construction worker I can attest to the fact that people who work in concrete every day go through clothes fast. That does not however create a tax deduction and the rules for deductible clothing are well known to members of this board.

1. got it.
2. the rule is can it be used in public not whether the TP uses it in public. all the items you mentioned can...I would take nothing
3. I agree with this
4. agree again...as since we know this so well why is "appearance clothing" any different. The only things I would consider are items like a musical group that all wears the same outfit..."costume". Aloha Airlines that has all their employees wear the same aloha shirt. Or here out bus company all wear shirts that look like aloha shirts and have "the bus" on them.
I don't ever consider suits for men or women as uniforms. Or any clothing other than mentioned above as deductible unless the meet the requirements.

[tacks]

...4. As a former construction worker I can attest to the fact that people who work in concrete every day go through clothes fast. That does not however create a tax deduction and the rules for deductible clothing are well known to members of this board.

Thanks for posting, erchess.

Not exactly the response i would have hoped for but thanks all the same.

[erchess]

TAXEA re my number two

You nailed the point exactly. It's a question of CAN the whatever be used for street wear.

As far as no facial hair I think you're right - no one would say "I can't go out in public until I do something about my lack of facial hair." I was looking at it from the standpoint of "No one who is not on TV would need to remove every last vestige of facial hair" which is true enough but that isn't the test.

Regarding makeup however I think we have a different understanding of the underlying facts and not a disagreement about tax law. It at least used to be the case that people who were appearing under very bright lights such as are used for filming TV and movies and for staged plays wear makeup that looks totally ridiculous without an almost blindingly bright light shined on it. Under that fact pattern what I said about makeup is correct but if the facts of TV makeup have changed then I could be years out of date.

[tpnl]

Previously worked for the IRS

We bought out a small single accountant a few years back. She used to work for the IRS long time ago. When we were preparing her clients returns we found flagrant errors. She didn't like how we were preparing them the right way. She spouted off one day, "I don't work for the IRS." She used to and she had to know how bad some of her work was.

[Zee]

Possi-

IMHO,

As flagrant as the preparer seems to be, you should "flag" him. He's an embarassment to the profession.