# Tax Time Again



## akwunomy (Jan 12, 2020)

Have a question..,a partner told me..,they deduct Food and Laundry….
Is that true

thanks


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## Older Chauffeur (Oct 16, 2014)

akwunomy said:


> Have a question..,a partner told me..,they deduct Food and Laundry….
> Is that true
> 
> thanks


I’m not a tax professional, but there have been discussions here in the past in a similar vein. I think the IRS allows food only when you travel out of your home area and an overnight stay is required. Laundry for clothes when out of town for a few days(?) maybe. Clothes and laundry/dry cleaning would otherwise only be allowed if the job requires a specific uniform as in law enforcement, for example.
Some would say that you can deduct anything, until you get audited.😳


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## Stevie The magic Unicorn (Apr 3, 2018)

akwunomy said:


> Have a question..,a partner told me..,they deduct Food and Laundry….
> Is that true
> 
> thanks


So here’s the deal as far as I understand the situation.

In this business laundry is a big fat no.

there are exceptions, if your expensive clothing got damaged in the course of working then the repair/replacement or cleaning would be deductible. Consider you are wearing an expensive Prada suit to go with your caddilac and you got puker on and the dry cleaning bill was $X.

that would be deductible. Same if it was ruined.


now the purchase of clothing is more cut and dry. Unless you buy a “uniform” or something completely unacceptable to wear on s daily basis than it isn’t deductible. However if you were required to have shirts with s logo that you were specifically banned from wearing outside work hours it would tick every single box making it deductible.

imagine a jumpsuit with logos on it that was stained with petro-chemicals.

yeah that’s a deductible expenses.

As Uber has a very lax dress code, almost nothing would apply to us.

I however am part of that small exception. I have taxi company shirts I wear that I’m not allowed to go out drinking in. So they would be deductible.

Onto the food. The IRS gives a specific example of s situation where food is not deductible that isn’t travel.

this is an iRS publication explaining the situation.

so looking at the situation… you have to be stopping and sleeping a significant number or hours and taking yourself off the road. The truck driving example is very similar to the longest fares I’ve ever had since 2010 when I started driving a cab.










I’ll give two examples of situations.

Example one…

I do a long fare from Orlando to Daytona beach. After dropping them off I stop at Wawa for snacks and get back on the road.

That “meal” would not be deductible.


example 2

I book a hotel room at Daytona beach and work 3 days doing the Daytona 500 weekend.

I eat 9 meals out and have 3 nights at a hotel,


in that case it would be deductible because I was out of town, taking significant breaks etc.

I actually did that this year, and just recently.


So it’s about context, not even how far you went. In my two examples they went to the same place and one is deductible and the other isn’t. Because the context of the expenses was different.


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## Seamus (Jun 21, 2018)

Older Chauffeur said:


> I’m not a tax professional, but there have been discussions here in the past in a similar vein. I think the IRS allows food only when you travel out of your home area and an overnight stay is required. Laundry for clothes when out of town for a few days(?) maybe. Clothes and laundry/dry cleaning would otherwise only be allowed if the job requires a specific uniform as in law enforcement, for example.
> Some would say that you can deduct anything, until you get audited.😳


Not to jump in on your accurate answer, but just to clarify something that really does affect r/s drivers. Your “home area” does not mean where you live, but rather “where you normally work”. There are drivers who live in rural areas who drive 100 miles to work in a city and may stay there a few days a week and go home. If for example every week they drive 100 miles to San Francisco and stay for 3 days, then SF is there “normal work area” so meals and lodging are not deductible. However, if they drove 100 miles in a different direction to stay for 3 days working a music festival, then meals and lodging would be deductible.


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