Dependent Care Credit

[sva232]

My child's dad pays the majority of expenses for our child, so he claims him as a dependent on his taxes. However for childcare, he paid for our child's school and I paid for a nanny. Our child attended school 3 days a week and we would have a nanny two days a week. Can he claim the school expense as child dependent care credit as well as the child tax credit and I claim the expenses of the nanny under the dependent care credit? 

[xmasbaby0]

Are you the custodial parent?  Do you have an agreement with the other parent to allow the other parent to claim them--due to divorce or that you live apart and share custody?  Did one of you sign a Form 8332?

If there is a signed 8332 then the custodial parent retains the right to file as Head of Household, get earned income credit and the childcare credit.  The non-custodial parent gets the child tax credit for children under the age of 17.

As far as the IRS is concerned, the custodial parent is the one with whom the child spent the most nights during the tax year--at least 183 nights.

If you are a non-married couple who live together then only one of you can claim the child(ren) and the one not claiming the child does not enter anything at all on their tax return about the child. 

[Hal_Al]

It depends. Are you unmarried and living together or are you divorced or separated (including never married) parents?

 If you and the other parent live together, either one of you (but not both) may claim the child. You may decide between you which one will claim the child*. Only if you can’t agree, do the IRS tie breaker rules apply, to see who has first choice.  Whoever claims the dependent and child tax credit is the only one that can claim the dependent care credit.  School tuition (K-12) does not count as dependent care.

The interview is confusing (it's designed for divorced parents, who are allowed to split the child). The second parent should not enter the child, at all.

On the other hand, if you are the custodial parent, and are allowing the non custodial parent to claim the child this year, you should be aware that 

 There is a special rule in the case of divorced & separated (including never married) parents. When the non-custodial parent is claiming the child as a dependent/exemption/child tax credit; the custodial parent is still allowed to claim the same child for Earned Income Credit, Head of Household filing status, and day care credit. This "splitting of the child" is not available to parents who lived together at any time during the last 6 months of the year; then only one of you can claim the child for any tax reasons. The tax benefits may not be split in any other manner.

Note in particular that the non-custodial parent can never claim the Earned Income Credit, Head of Household filing status or the day care credit, based on that child, even when the custodial parent has released the dependency to him.

*It may be worthwhile to prepare trial returns, both ways,  to see which way the family comes out best. This tool may be useful: https://turbotax.intuit.com/tax-tools/calculators/taxcaster/?s=1.

A common error is when unmarried parents live together,  If you and the other parent live together, only one of you can claim the child for any tax benefit.