Related Education Expenses Credit for College Employee Receiving Tuition Waiver (Remission)

Forum|Forum|6 years ago
March 14, 2020
2 replies
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Hello,

I work for a college and also go to the same college at least half time. We receive a tuition waiver and hence pay nothing out of pocket for the education other than books and related materials and nothing is added to our W-2 for this benefit as well. My question relates to qualified expenses, ie books/related materials and how I can get a credit for those.

When I enter my 1098T information my box for payments and scholarships, it is the same amount, obviously since it is a waiver this makes sense. My question is related to the secondary questions that are asked after entering that. When I enter my qualified expenses it accepts them, however when I get to the next screen where it asks how much was scholarships, employer reimbursement, etc, if I enter the same amount there then it tells me I have no expenses for the credits. If I don't enter the amounts in the secondary question it gives me the credit.

I guess I don't understand if I am supposed to be putting the amounts that are already on the scholarships portion of the 1098T in the secondary questions or not? It seems redundant that it is asking twice even though it was already reported and I feel I should receive some credit for the books I paid out of pocket which is significant over a year.

Hal_Al

Employee

You have identified the problem: don't re-enter the amounts that are already on the scholarships portion of the 1098-T. You are allowed to claim those out-of-pocket expenses for the education credit.

Carl11_2

Employee

Actually, what you have from the school is not a waiver per-Se. It's a scholarship and is already included in box 5 of your 1098-T. So don't enter that amount anywhere else on your tax return.