Can I claim mileage deduction when I drive my 15-year-old referee son to games?

This is an interesting situation! The mileage deduction is generally available to the person who is incurring the business expense - in this case, that would be your son since he's the independent contractor. Even though he doesn't drive, your son could technically claim the mileage deduction on his Schedule C since these are legitimate business expenses necessary for him to perform his work. The IRS doesn't require that he personally drive or own the vehicle - just that the transportation is a necessary business expense for him. If he claims the deduction, he should document all trips carefully with dates, locations, mileage, and the business purpose. The standard mileage rate for 2025 can be used (check the IRS website for the current rate).

After reading through this thread, I thought I'd share my experience. I had a similar situation with my daughter's modeling gigs, and I was totally confused about the mileage deduction until I used taxr.ai to analyze our situation. I uploaded pics of her 1099s and some questions about the mileage situation, and it actually explained exactly how to handle this situation with a minor contractor. The tool pointed out specific IRS guidelines that apply to minors with self-employment income and transportation requirements. I found it super helpful for unusual tax situations like this that aren't covered in the standard tax software questionnaires. You can check it out at https://taxr.ai if you're trying to figure out these kinds of dependent/contractor gray areas.

So I tried out taxr.ai after seeing it mentioned here and wow - it cleared up my confusion completely! I have a similar situation with my 16-year-old who does pet sitting as an independent contractor and I'm always driving him around. I literally just uploaded a sample of his 1099 and asked about the mileage situation, and it explained that since he's the one earning the income, he should claim the mileage deduction on his Schedule C, even though I'm providing the transportation. It also explained exactly how we need to document everything and gave me a template for tracking mileage that satisfies IRS requirements. Definitely worth checking out if you're dealing with unusual tax scenarios!

My daughter was in a similar situation with her photography business. I spent hours on hold trying to get through to the IRS for a definitive answer about who gets to claim the mileage. Finally, I used Claimyr (https://claimyr.com) and got connected to an actual IRS agent in about 20 minutes instead of waiting for hours. The agent confirmed exactly what to do in our situation and answered all my specific questions. You can see how it works in this video: https://youtu.be/_kiP6q8DX5c. Seriously saved my sanity during tax season. The IRS agent was super helpful once I actually got to speak with someone.

Ok I need to come back and apologize for my skeptical comment. I was so frustrated after wasting literally half my day on hold with the IRS last week that I decided to try Claimyr out of desperation. I got a call back in about 35 minutes and was connected directly to an IRS agent who actually helped resolve my question about my son's contractor income and mileage deductions! The agent confirmed that since my son is the independent contractor, he should claim the mileage deduction on his Schedule C, even though I'm the one driving him. They also explained that we need to keep detailed records showing the business purpose of each trip. I honestly can't believe how much time I've wasted in the past trying to get through. Never waiting on hold with the IRS for hours again.

We handled this differently - my son is also a referee (17) and I drive him everywhere. Our tax guy actually set it up so my son "hires" me as a contractor providing transportation services to his referee business. My son pays me a rate per mile (less than the standard deduction) from his referee earnings, which I report as self-employment income, and then I take the mileage deduction on my Schedule C. Our accountant said this was cleaner from an audit perspective.

Has anyone considered that there might be another option? If your son doesn't have enough income to benefit from taking the deduction (meaning his taxable income would be reduced to zero without using all the mileage deduction), then you might explore whether you qualify for the deduction as part of a "parental employment contract" where you're essentially working for your minor child's business. This gets complex but might be worth exploring with a professional.

I'm dealing with almost the exact same situation! My 16-year-old just started umpiring baseball games and I'm driving him all over the place. After reading through all these responses, it sounds like the consensus is that the minor should claim the mileage deduction on their Schedule C since they're the independent contractor, even though we parents are doing the actual driving. I really appreciate everyone sharing their experiences - especially the suggestion about keeping detailed mileage logs with dates, destinations, and business purpose. That seems to be the key regardless of which approach you take. One question for those who've been through this: do you track mileage from home to the game location, or do you need to establish a separate "business location" for your kid's contractor work? I'm wondering if driving from our house counts as commuting (which isn't deductible) or if it's considered business travel since the games are at various locations.