If you are planning on filing your tax return sooner rather than later this tax season you had better check with your tax preparer. Due to the late Congressional action to enact tax law changes several forms have not been released from the IRS yet and are causing some taxpayers to not be able to file until at least February 14th! The affected tax forms are:
1. Itemized deductions on Schedule A. The election to choose between deducting state & local general sales & use tax instead of state & local income taxes is holding this form up.
2. Tuition and fees paid to post-secondary institutions claimed on Form 8917. This is an above-the line deduction for higher education tuition and fees and education credit like the American Opportunity Tax Credit or the Lifetime Learning Credit.
3. The above-the-line deduction on Form 1040 for kindergarten through grade 12 educators with out of pocket classroom expenses.
A kinder, gentler IRS would have extended the deadline for filing tax returns since they don’t have the forms available to the public but I haven’t heard anything about what the public or more importantly I am supposed to do about the reduced amount of time to file!