First of all i would like to say that i am very excited to join this great forum, i've been browsing these forums for a while and finally mustard up the courage to join.

And now to the real issue,

I have been trucking for a couple years now, but last year i decided to be an owner operator, i achieved my own authority, and im currently driving one truck under my own authority.

for 2007 my taxes including IFTA were done by my accountant, but for 2008 with the surge fuel prices i have begun to cut cost in every aspect i possibly can. So for for 2008 i decided to do my own IFTA taxes and save a few hundred dollars

My Question is, what programs do i need to use or buy, to accurately complete my taxes and not fear of any audits occurring.?

the only problem im facing is that i did not keep track of the miles between states for all my trips. So basically i just have the cumulative mileage for each trip and thats it. I guess i need to get some kind of mileage calculator, but i dont know where to begin.

With that being said, if anyone can please guide me in the right direction, it would be greatly appreciated and not forgotten.

Once again, thank you for your time.

I do my own fuel taxes. It's easy, one of those things you do once and wonder why you hadn't started sooner. Anyway to answer your question just write down your mileage upon entering and leaving every state, also remember the main hi-ways used, and if you purchased fuel you'll need the gallon amount. You can make up your own form as long as it's neat and simple. I have been audited twice by IFTA in 11 years and both times they complimented my system. Your form should have starting and finishing mileage, the date of the trip, starting and finishing points, each state used and the fuel reciept showing the state, truck# and gal. You should have a column or space for miles traveled in each state. and one with hi=ways used, you subtract the entering miles from the exiting miles and thats miles traveled in the state. You do not have to show miles on hi-ways. If you get audited they enter that infomation into thier program and use your hi=way info for a comparison and if it's close enough your in good shape. One more thing, you can put multiple trips on one report The auditers are very nice and are not looking for small mistakes, they're looking for cheaters

wow thank you for the very detailed reply, i follow what your saying, but the one problem im facing as i said earlier is that i did not write the down miles for each state i drove thru, hence i was wondering if i could somehow some kind of program that will tell me the mileage.


thanks.

Alot of companies use pcmiler. They don't even have the drivers write down the miles. They use the routing from the program.

Sorry JFK after re-reading your post I realized I didn't entirly answer your question. There have been times in the past I or my drivers forgot to jot down the miles for what ever reason you can imagine, Rand McNally has a very inexpensive program called trip maker, I think it's around $30.00 jusk look for the name of the closest town to the state line where you entered the state and where you exited and do quick- trip, that will be close enough. If the town was in the state a few miles just add the difference. the IFTA software practicly works the same way. Also most of the auditing is done at random. As I said before, they're not worried about a small difference. even if you entered a state like MS. on I-20 and exited on I- 20 You could have been re routed because of a wreck or stopped at 2 or3 truck stops and any of these events would alter your mileage. Just don't under estimate

pc-miler is good but expensive. In fact for a large fleet it's perfect. but you still have to feed it some info for it to work

I only mentioned it because some companies use it.

The one I use was only about 20.00 and you can't get it anymore.

It works independent of the internet. Not like the latest one of them I put on and it kept trying to log on.

Flattop,

thank you for all the advice, it makes things much clearer now, so technically i can use online stuff like google maps, or Microsoft streets and trips, to figure out the miles.

A few more questions and i will stop bothering everyone.

Do i only use the miles that i traveled on interstates and highways? or streets as well?

When it comes to multiplying the tax rate for each state, i only multiply the tax rate in states in which i traveled and bought fuel? so for example if i drove 90 miles in florida and got fuel there, that means i multiply the 90 miles times watever the given tax rate?

once again thank you all, so much for all this help, finally ill be able to sleep at night.

You use the total miles for each state travled in empty or loaded, that means every street, county road, state hi-way and Interstate from the time you enter the state to the time you leave. That is why {assuming your odometer is accurate} odometer miles are the closest to correct. Now you show every state with or without fuel purchases. I will try to explain the basic idea and you may get a better picture. At the end of the qtr. you will take your total miles traveled and your total fuel gal. purchased. and figure your avg. miles per gal. that is all miles in every state and all fuel purchased. You will be paying,or not paying based on that figure{ ther are some exceptions I will comment on later}. then you add up all the miles for each state separate;y: for ex. from 1/1/08 until 3/31/08 you traveled in Ga. ten different times, each time you traveled a total of 100 miles, so for that qtr. you have 1000 miles in SC now your mpg avg. for qtr is 5 mpg. you should have purchased 200 gal. in sc if you bought more you get a refund, if you bought none you owe the state fuel tax per gal. X 200--- $28.00 ---So to sum it up: you owe each state the amount of fuel tax you should have purchased for the amount of miles traveled in that state for the qtr. based on your mpg based on total fuel purchases against total miles traveled in qtr. that being the basic idea some states have sir charges or other nifty ways to get your money, and the form you get from your state will let you know that stuff. Be nice to the people you deal with at the state level because they will get to know you. there are exemptions such as toll roads and bobtailing and in my case it is so little that it's not worth the extra paper work involved. If I can be of anymore help please let me know. Also please don't forget I am basing this info on my operation in SC

I just realized I started using Ga. for an example and finished the example in SC please bear with me I have many dead brain cells, Just say you started and finished in SC except for the tax rate any state will work.