Deductions & credits

Q. As a parent, do I need to file his 1098T?

A. Simple answer: No. The 1098-T is only an informational document. The numbers on it are not required to be entered onto your tax return. 

But taxes aren't simple. 

There is a tax “loop hole” available. The student reports all his scholarship, up to the amount needed to claim the American Opportunity Credit (AOC), as income on his return. That way, the parents  (or himself, if he is not a dependent) can claim the tuition credit on their return. They can do this because that much tuition was no longer paid by "tax free" scholarship.  You cannot do this if the school’s billing statement specifically shows the scholarships being applied to tuition or if the conditions of the grant are that it be used to pay for qualified expenses.  Pell grants are not usually restricted. 

Using an example: Student has $10,000 in box 5 of the 1098-T and $8000 in box 1. At first glance he/she has $2000 of taxable income and nobody can claim the American opportunity credit. But if she reports $6000 as income on her return, the parents can claim $4000 of qualified expenses on their return.

Books and computers are also qualifying expenses for the AOC. So, extending the example, the student had another $1000 in expenses for those course materials, paid out of pocket, she would only need to report $5000 of taxable scholarship income, instead of $6000.

The IRS actually encourages use of this technique. From the form 1040 instructions: “You may be able to increase an education credit if the student chooses to include all or part of a Pell grant or certain other scholarships or fellowships in income. For more information, see Pub. 970, the instructions for Form 1040 and IRS.gov/EdCredit".  PUB 970 even has examples of how to do the “loop hole”.

If your son's total reportable income is less than $12, 950, he does not need to file a tax return*. But you may want to have him file anyway to document the reporting of the taxable scholarship. 

*Unless he has Unearned income (interest, dividends, capital gains, unemployment, taxable portion of 529 distribution) of more than $1150 (2022).  Taxable scholarship is treated as earned income for this purpose. 

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How to do that in TurboTax:

You can both use the 1098-T to enter the expenses. If you claim the tuition credit, you do need to report that you got one (the TurboTax interview will handle this) Your student should use the 1098-T because it makes entering scholarship income go smoother and puts the income in the right place on the tax forms. Taxable scholarship is now reported on (new for 2022) line 8r of Schedule 1, rather than line 1 of form 1040.

You essentially have to use a work around in TurboTax (TT).  Here's how I would do it. Enter the 1098-T, on your return, but only enter $4000 in box 1. No other numbers. You only enter the 1098-T to get TurboTax to check the proper box on form 8863. Lying to TurboTax to get it to do what you want does not constitute lying to the IRS.

Enter the 1098-T, exactly as received, on the student's return. Enter book expenses separately.  In his interview, you should eventually reach a screen called "Amount used to calculate education deduction or credit" Be sure the amount in that box is $4000. That will put all his excess scholarship as income on his return.  

Be advised some people are saying they're not getting the "Amount used to claim the tuition deduction or credit" screen on the dependent’s interview.  Check the student information work sheet (part VI, line 17) to verify it was entered.  If not, the alternate workaround is  to enter $4000 less than the actual box 1  amount, when you enter the 1098-T. 

There's yet another (and simplest) work around. Manually calculate the taxable amount of scholarship and enter the 1098-T, on his return, with 0 in box 1 and the  taxable amount  in box 5. In that case be sure the amount in the  "Amount used to claim the tuition deduction or credit" box is 0.