Doing my own taxes

If you make $45k you are paying taxes on $45k. If you have $10k in writeoffs, that's not $10k you get back, it means you are only paying taxes on $35k of the $45k you made. So at 30% you would owe just under $15k if you earned $45k. By writing off $10k, you are paying taxes on $35k or about $9k in taxes. So you spent $10k on trucking related items and are essentially getting $6k back.

 

There's quite a few threads on this topic. Have a wee search in this section and a bit of reading and you'll be throwing in the driver towel and doing taxes for a living!

 

This forum is full of doctors, lawyers, cpa's, psychologists, journalist, etc, posing as truck drivers.

Just give it a bit and you'll be thoroughly confused when it's all said and done

 

Just print out a schedule C on the internet and read through the line items.

 

Well -,the best I can suggest is Turbo Tax - we used it for 7 years with dual trucking income, 4 rentals and what not.

It guides you through it step by step.

 

There are people who go to school for this sort of thing, they know all the ins & outs, and everything in between. Hire a professional, you'll be glad you did.

 

Whats the old saying," a person that represents himself in court has fool for a lawyer", I think this holds true for accounting also. Get someone that will get it right and not cut corners.

 

Great, I think it is a worthy endeavor. I use TurboTax and recommend it, but you can do it with pen & paper too. There are also other tax program offerings from H&R Block, TaxACT, etc.

You can write off a great many things if you can reasonably show them to be work expenses. Just a small list:

standard meal allowance (per diem)
GPS
cb radio
pens/paper
Safety gear
laundry expenses on the road
hotels on the road
the % of your cell phone bill used for work purposes
unreimbursed parking fees
showers
etc

Ok, you're talking about the W4 you filled out when hired: https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/fw4.pdf

If you put a low number (in your case 0) for that, your employer will send a larger portion of your wages to the IRS as withholding. You can still get it back when you file your taxes and show your deductions -- you've basically just given the government an interest-free loan.

If you keep getting large refunds every year, you can always adjust your w4 withholding number upward so that your employer sends less to the IRS on your behalf.

I really think TurboTax has done a great job breaking down a complex tax filing into very simple questions:


Every now and then you may have a question that the program doesn't address, but TurboTax's support pages online probably have your answer.

For example, if you google "how do I enter trucker per diem in turbotax" you get a nice write-up: https://ttlc.intuit.com/questions/2...-my-department-of-transportation-dot-per-diem


If you still feel nervous not having "a professional" do your taxes, you can always print out the return TurboTax gives and compare it to what the professional does (and ask them to explain any differences). A lot of the so-called professionals in the retail tax shops, especially around tax time, are just temporary workers with no real training who are using a program like turbotax while you sit there.