"Go through the education section again. When you get to the screen that says “Here’s your Education Summary”. Click edit next to “Education Information”. When you get to the screen titled “Amount Used to Calculate Education Deduction or Credit”, verify the amount you want to use or change it."
This is the guidance I was referring to in my first link. I can get to a "Here's Your Education Summary" page, but it just lists Tuition, Other Expenses, etc - nothing about going through an interview. I've clicked every Edit button, and deleted/re-entered tuition/1098-T data, and have come across nothing about using expenses for credit.
At the very beginning, I get "You can't claim tuition and other fees" which says I should Continue "to avoid paying tax on your ... qualified tuition program (QTP)", but that seems to be exactly what it causes.
Jump to letme just gives "This topic doesn't apply to you because you don't have any qualified education expenses in your tax return", even though there are. On the "Your 1099 Deductions and Credits", my entered 1099-Q data appears, but the line for "Expenses and Scholarships" shows $0. I can go into the details to where it asks whether I've received a 1098-T, answer yes, and all the correct cost data is there.
To simplify things and answer some questions:
- we are not eligible for any of the credits - income limitations
- we received no scholarships to offset the costs. This is a simple "school billed us full cost, we paid full cost"
- 1099-Q is in my name - distributions to me, and I paid the school (reasons aren't really relevant).
- All payments were in the same calendar year as the costs.
