Vehicles and Taxes

Operating a car or truck can be expensive. If you're using a vehicle in your business, it's important to get all the tax breaks that the laws allow. So, we'll examine more closely some of the tax issues that arise in relation to vehicles:

• Tax consequences of buying a vehicle will help you to understand the federal excise taxes that you may have to pay when you purchase a vehicle.
• Business use of a car explains when car travel is and isn't deductible. It spotlights the differences among business usage, commuting, and personal usage, and shows how to keep records that allocate your car expenses among the different types of usage.
• How to compute your vehicle expenses helps you to decide which of two basic methods for tracking and claiming vehicle expenses — the standard mileage deduction method and the actual expense method — will work best for you.
• When employees use vehicles explains the tax treatment of reimbursements you make to employees who use their own cars, as well as the treatment of company cars you provide to your employees.
• Claiming your business vehicle deductions will help you to determine the appropriate tax form to use when reporting your vehicle deductions.