Using airplane/helicopter in construction business

I have been in the construction business for many years and I was
wondering if any pilots here write off their flights for business.
I've seen a few of our posters in here posting in cunstruction forums,
but never mentioned aircraft use in there.

Flyingmonk wrote:
I have been in the construction business for many years and I was
wondering if any pilots here write off their flights for business.
I've seen a few of our posters in here posting in cunstruction forums,
but never mentioned aircraft use in there.

I made only one flight that qualified, and I found that my tax package has no
allowance for easily writing off such a flight. In order to do that, I would've
had to enter the aircraft as a vehicle, record all the expenses, and write the
actual expenses off. It wasn't worth it for that one flight. If I were using an
aircraft for business even half as much as I use my truck, I would have jumped
through the hoops necessary.

George Patterson
Coffee is only a way of stealing time that should by rights belong to
your slightly older self.

This brings up a good question. Maybe I should post it in a new thread.

I am a student with Utah Valley State College. As part of my course work I
am required to get my PPL, Instrument, and Commercial licenses. Since I
know you can write off school, there is no question about my tuition.
However, can I write off my flights? That would give me a nice $7000.00
deduction for the year.

--
John Huthmaker

http://www.cogentnetworking.com
"Flyingmonk" wrote in message
ups.com...
I have been in the construction business for many years and I was
wondering if any pilots here write off their flights for business.
I've seen a few of our posters in here posting in cunstruction forums,
but never mentioned aircraft use in there.

"John Huthmaker" wrote in message
k.net...
This brings up a good question. Maybe I should post it in a new thread.

You probably should have.

I am a student with Utah Valley State College. As part of my course work
I am required to get my PPL, Instrument, and Commercial licenses. Since I
know you can write off school, there is no question about my tuition.
However, can I write off my flights? That would give me a nice $7000.00
deduction for the year.

You'll find better advice from a tax lawyer than from this newsgroup.

That said, I am reasonably certain that any flying not specifically required
by your school cannot be deducted. And I think you should probably
double-check on the question of the costs that are specifically required by
your school. Unless you are actually paying for that through tuition paid
directly to the college, I think it's possible the IRS would exclude those
costs as well.

Pete

I am a student with Utah Valley State College. As part of my course work
I am required to get my PPL, Instrument, and Commercial licenses. Since
I know you can write off school, there is no question about my tuition.
However, can I write off my flights? That would give me a nice $7000.00
deduction for the year.

("Peter Duniho" wrote)
You'll find better advice from a tax lawyer than from this newsgroup.


Maybe true, but the tax advise here is FREE ...and plentiful. :-)

....and for my purposes, usually pretty darn entertaining.

BTW, if school says he needs his PPL, along with his Instrument and
Commercial, then I suspect others have come before him (at UVSC) with the
same tax based question. What do 'the kids in the hall' have to say?


Montblack

Plane and Pilot had a Tax article about a year or so ago that was pretty
good. I wrote (and am writing) off my PPL and my Instrument. I support
networks for clients that are 10hrs+ away by car, so the IRS allows this as
a normal training expense. According to the P&P article and my accountant,
I can take these deductions as non-reimbursed business expenses (training),
just like I was learning a new software app.

The main issues are that I have to ALREADY have clients in places that
flying becomes benificial, meaning I can't say "I'm gonna expand to another
state next year, so I want to learn to fly". I have to already have the
clients in that state to use them as justification.

Also, I can't write off any rating that would be classified as "career
changing". Or something I am using to change career paths. So, my
Commercial doesn't qualify or my ATP. But Multi would, if I have a plane
for that purpose, etc.

As with everything, check it out for yourselves, but it's working for
me....so far.

jf
"George Patterson" wrote in message
news:z4jmf.50$Ea6.30@trnddc08...
Flyingmonk wrote:
I have been in the construction business for many years and I was
wondering if any pilots here write off their flights for business.
I've seen a few of our posters in here posting in cunstruction forums,
but never mentioned aircraft use in there.

I made only one flight that qualified, and I found that my tax package has
no allowance for easily writing off such a flight. In order to do that, I
would've had to enter the aircraft as a vehicle, record all the expenses,
and write the actual expenses off. It wasn't worth it for that one flight.
If I were using an aircraft for business even half as much as I use my
truck, I would have jumped through the hoops necessary.

George Patterson
Coffee is only a way of stealing time that should by rights belong to
your slightly older self.

"Jeff" wrote in message
...
Plane and Pilot had a Tax article about a year or so ago that was pretty
good. I wrote (and am writing) off my PPL and my Instrument. I support
networks for clients that are 10hrs+ away by car, so the IRS allows this
as a normal training expense. According to the P&P article and my
accountant, I can take these deductions as non-reimbursed business
expenses (training), just like I was learning a new software app.

I hope you don't get audited. On the bright side, you do have an accountant
you can blame everything on. Hopefully, he'll pay your penalties for you.

Everything I've ever read during research of tax deductions has indicated
that training is only deductible if it is DIRECTLY related to your EXISTING
profession. Even if you are training to become a professional pilot, until
you ARE a professional pilot, the pilot training is not deductible. Pilot
training for the furtherance of some profession OTHER than piloting would be
non-deductible without exception.

The main issues are that I have to ALREADY have clients in places that
flying becomes benificial, meaning I can't say "I'm gonna expand to
another state next year, so I want to learn to fly". I have to already
have the clients in that state to use them as justification.

I can easily believe that flight expenses directly related to visiting those
clients is deductible. That's a perfectly legitimate business expense. But
the training required so that you can be qualified to make those flights
hardly seems like a deductible expense.

Also, I can't write off any rating that would be classified as "career
changing". Or something I am using to change career paths. So, my
Commercial doesn't qualify or my ATP. But Multi would, if I have a plane
for that purpose, etc.

Odd that you would be aware of the issue of deductible expenses being
related to your existing career, and yet still be under the impression that
you can deduct flight training expenses when your profession has absolutely
nothing to do with piloting at all.

As with everything, check it out for yourselves, but it's working for
me....so far.

I hope you don't get audited.

Pete

I hope you don't get audited.

Pete

....as he forwards the thread to the IRS. :^)

I'll see if I can dig up the P&P article. (of course the auditors will just
stare at you when you try to convince them that P&P should be believed more
than the Tax code ).

As for learning to fly having nothing to do with my job, that's not true at
all. My job requires quick response times. Currently, some of those
responses are 5-10 hours, which is detrimental to my business. Now,
according to what little digging and asking I have done (my brother is a
Revenue Officer, so he cringes when I talk to him about this ), as long
as i'm not being paid to fly and that flying is only a "better" means of
transportation to get me TO the site, then I'm good. Just like if the
business paid to have someone learn a new software app in order to do their
job better.

I'm not advocating this for anyone, I'm just saying that when I read the P&P
article, I asked a tax accountant and then called the IRS and asked the
$10/hr person who answered the phone. So, in reality, I'll still be the one
going to jail.

And BTW, don't fall for the "my accountant signed off" veil. When the tax
comes due, my brother (and his like) come to YOU, not your accountant. The
taxes, penalties and interest all fall on the taxpayer, not the preparer. I
know a guy that went down hard believing he could skirt his taxes and that
his accountant was a curtain for him. Not so. Taxman showed up at his door
and his accountant suddenly became hard to find

jf


"Peter Duniho" wrote in message
...
"Jeff" wrote in message
...
Plane and Pilot had a Tax article about a year or so ago that was pretty
good. I wrote (and am writing) off my PPL and my Instrument. I support
networks for clients that are 10hrs+ away by car, so the IRS allows this
as a normal training expense. According to the P&P article and my
accountant, I can take these deductions as non-reimbursed business
expenses (training), just like I was learning a new software app.

I hope you don't get audited. On the bright side, you do have an
accountant you can blame everything on. Hopefully, he'll pay your
penalties for you.

Everything I've ever read during research of tax deductions has indicated
that training is only deductible if it is DIRECTLY related to your
EXISTING profession. Even if you are training to become a professional
pilot, until you ARE a professional pilot, the pilot training is not
deductible. Pilot training for the furtherance of some profession OTHER
than piloting would be non-deductible without exception.

The main issues are that I have to ALREADY have clients in places that
flying becomes benificial, meaning I can't say "I'm gonna expand to
another state next year, so I want to learn to fly". I have to already
have the clients in that state to use them as justification.

I can easily believe that flight expenses directly related to visiting
those clients is deductible. That's a perfectly legitimate business
expense. But the training required so that you can be qualified to make
those flights hardly seems like a deductible expense.

Also, I can't write off any rating that would be classified as "career
changing". Or something I am using to change career paths. So, my
Commercial doesn't qualify or my ATP. But Multi would, if I have a plane
for that purpose, etc.

Odd that you would be aware of the issue of deductible expenses being
related to your existing career, and yet still be under the impression
that you can deduct flight training expenses when your profession has
absolutely nothing to do with piloting at all.

As with everything, check it out for yourselves, but it's working for
me....so far.

I hope you don't get audited.

Pete

"Jeff" wrote in message
...
I'll see if I can dig up the P&P article.

I don't need to see the article. I believe that P&P printed it. I just
don't have a lot of faith in their ability to provide tax advice.

[...]
As for learning to fly having nothing to do with my job, that's not true
at all. My job requires quick response times. Currently, some of those
responses are 5-10 hours, which is detrimental to my business.

Nothing about solving that problem requires *you* to retrain.

Now, according to what little digging and asking I have done (my brother
is a Revenue Officer, so he cringes when I talk to him about this ), as
long as i'm not being paid to fly and that flying is only a "better" means
of transportation to get me TO the site, then I'm good.

Flying may be better, but it doesn't mean that you need to be trained as a
pilot. It just means that you can deduct flight expenses (whether you fly
or you hire the flying out).

Just like if the business paid to have someone learn a new software app in
order to do their job better.

If the software is related to the job, the training can be deducted. But
even there, an accountant can't deduct training to learn Photoshop, for
example. Even if it does help him "fix" his scanned receipts.

I'm not advocating this for anyone, I'm just saying that when I read the
P&P article, I asked a tax accountant and then called the IRS and asked
the $10/hr person who answered the phone. So, in reality, I'll still be
the one going to jail.

Well, I'd hope that with the "official" say-so from an IRS representative,
you'd have a pretty good defense. I don't know how they work the penalties,
but I'd hope that they'd only make you pay back taxes. Charging you fines
for their own mistake would be pretty rotten (even if consistent with some
of the other things the IRS has done).

And BTW, don't fall for the "my accountant signed off" veil. When the tax
comes due, my brother (and his like) come to YOU, not your accountant.

I know that legally the taxpayer is responsible. But you can bet that in
such a situation, I'd be asking my accountant to foot the bill for his
mistakes. If asking politely doesn't work, there are other ways.

I realize many accountants will disavow any responsibility for their
mistakes. IMHO, that sort of accountant isn't worth the cost of the phone
call needed to fire them. It reminds me of the CPA I used one year who had
ME do all the data entry, and then did not even bother to double-check the
numbers with my original documents. I made an error, and caught it only
because I compared his return to the one I prepared using TurboTax. Guess
which one I use now.

I figure, if I'm going to be the one to suffer the consequences of tax
decisions, I might as well be the one making them.

Pete