IRS Form 1098-T | Tuition Statement
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The IRS form 1098-T, the Tuition Payment Statement, must be filled out by colleges and universities, with copies going to both to students and to the IRS. The information contained in the 1098-T is needed by the student in filling out IRS Form 8863, which in turn is used to establish the student’s eligibility for the Hope or the Lifetime Learning tax credits for education. The numbers provided will also be relevant to the student’s Form 1040, or that of the person claiming the student as a dependent.
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How to Fill-in
The IRS lists some specific exemption to the requirement for educational institutes to file the Form 1098-T. These include courses that don’t offer academic credit, or for non-resident aliens students, unless the student specifically requests a 1098-T. The requirement is also waived if the student is on a full scholarship, or if his or her tuition is entirely paid for by an employer or by a government entity.
The left side of the Form 1098-T that the student will receive from the educational institute contains it’s name and address on the top, and directly under that are spaces for the institute’s federal id number and the student’s social security number. Below that is the student’s address, and Box 8, which is checked if the student attends school at least half time.
The right side of the Form 1098-T starts with Box 1 and Box 2. Either the former is filled in with the payments received for tuition or other qualified expenses, or the latter contains what was, instead, billed for those same expenses. Beneath that, Box 3 is checked if the school changed from a “payments received” to an “amounts billed” method of reporting since last year.
Just below that, Box 4 contains any adjustments that can now be noted to the amounts in either Box 1 or Box 2 on the Form 1098-T that was issued by the institute last year. To the right, any amount of a scholarship or grant is listed in Box 5.
Box 9 starts the last row of the Form 1098-T, and it is checked if the student is enrolled in a graduate program. Finally, Box 10 contains the amount of reimbursements for tuition or other qualified expenses that may have been made by an insurer. For the student, this is an important number, as it may affect the amount education credit that he or she can claim in this tax year, and it also may have an effect on this year’s total tax liability.
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