Because you do not on the vehicle, you cannot use the standard mileage rate. The standard mileage rate includes an allowance for depreciation, which you can only take if you are the owner. You must use the actual expense method.
to use the actual expense method, you must have a mileage diary or log that shows all of your business use, including the date, mileage driven, and business purpose. The delivery apps you use may provide this information for you, although you can also provide this information yourself by keeping a paper diary in the car or using a dedicated mileage tracking app. You also must know the total mileage driven buy the vehicle for the year so that you can determine the percentage of the total vehicle use that was for your business.
Then, you must also have the total vehicle expense for the year. This includes expenses that you actually pay for, such as gas, oil changes, other repairs, and insurance. Don’t include any expense that someone else pays for. You can deduct the percentage of total vehicle costs equal to the percentage of business use.
It’s not as simple as just deducting the gas you pay for, unless you can prove to the IRS that the vehicle is never driven for any personal reason, or you can show that you fill the car up with gas every evening before you start work and again after you finish work and are only deducting the gas you used on the business trips. Because under normal circumstances, were you fill the tank up once or twice a week, some of that gas is certainly going towards personal expenses and that is not allowed and he must have some way of tracking the difference.
