A form 1098-T provides the amount of tuition spent by a student during the previous tax year. It documents qualified tuition, fees, and other related course materials. The educational institution generates this form and mails it to the students by January 31. The students who receive a 1098-T must report it on their income tax forms.
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A 1098-T form is used for tax filing purposes. It will be used by someone who is a student or who had been a student in the previous year. The form will be given to the student by the college or university they attended. They may be mailed automatically, or a student can request the information from their university online.
The form will detail the amount of tuition payments that were made in the tax year. The expenses should include tuition for classes, registration fees, and fees for course materials. This information will need to be transferred to the appropriate tax filing forms.
This tax form is important because it determines if a student is eligible for certain benefits, such as the Hope Credit or the Lifetime Learning Credit. These education tax credits can give an enrolled student a break on the costs of their education.
A school must send Form 1098-T to any student who paid qualified educational expenses in the preceding tax year. Qualified expenses include tuition, fees, and required course materials. Schools must send the form to students before January 31 and file a copy with the IRS prior to February 28.
This IRS form is commonly used to provide information about educational expenses that may qualify a student or their parents or guardian for educational tax credits.
A 1098-T Form contains sections for:
Eligible educational institution - A college, university, vocational school, or other post-secondary educational institution that only admits students with a certificate of graduation from a secondary school; is legally authorized by its state to provide postsecondary education; provides a bachelor’s, associate’s or other degree that is acceptable to admission to a graduate or professional degree program; is a public or nonprofit institution; and is accredited by a nationally recognized accrediting agency or association.
Qualified tuition and educational expenses - Tuition, school fees, the costs of materials that are required to enroll in the higher education classes. This does not include: application and processing fees; books and materials that are not required to enroll in a class; courses that involve sports, games, or hobbies if not part of a degree program or skills training; room and board, insurance, transportation, personal costs.
Exceptions - A 1098-T does not need to be filed if the student: takes courses where they do not receive academic credit, is a nonresident alien, has tuition that is completely waived or completely covered by scholarship, has tuition covered by a third party under a formal agreement (such as the Department of Defense)
The Lifetime Learning Credit - up to $2,000 per eligible student for qualified education expenses.
American Opportunity Credit - $2,500 for each qualifying student per tax return. Forty percent of the American Opportunity Credit is refundable, which means that if the refundable portion of your credit is more than your tax, any excess up to $1,000 will be refunded to you, even if you owe no tax.
Form Requirements
The form requires you to provide several pieces of tax information including: filer’s name address, phone number, tax ID number, student’s name, address, phone number federal identification number. The form also requires the institution to fill out various information about the amount of tuition paid by the student or billed to the student, adjustments, scholarships and grants, and the student’s part-time or graduate status.
If you have questions about this form, you should speak to an experienced tax advisor for tax advice
