Not receiving W2 for working at my child's preschool - how to report these "wages"?

But if the preschool already paid taxes on the full tuition amount from other parents, wouldn't there be double taxation if the OP also reports it as income? And does this mean the OP also has to pay self-employment tax (the extra 15% for Social Security/Medicare) on top of regular income tax?

The preschool's tax situation is separate from yours. They would report your services as an expense, while receiving less tuition revenue from you, so there's no double taxation on their end. Yes, unfortunately you would be subject to self-employment tax (15.3%) on this income since it's considered self-employment. This covers your Social Security and Medicare contributions. However, you can deduct half of this self-employment tax on your Form 1040, which helps offset some of the additional tax burden.

How does taxr.ai actually work? Do you just upload documents and it tells you what forms to fill out? I have a similar situation but with a different type of bartering arrangement (I do landscaping for my landlord in exchange for reduced rent).

Sounds interesting but I'm skeptical. Couldn't you just google "how to report bartering income" and get the same info for free? What makes this better than just reading the IRS website?

You upload relevant documents (tuition statements, emails, whatever shows the arrangement) and it analyzes them to identify tax situations and proper reporting requirements. It then walks you through exactly what forms you need and how to complete them correctly. For your landscaping situation, it would recognize that as bartering income too. For me, the IRS guidance was confusing because there are different rules depending on whether you're considered an employee or contractor, and also different reporting requirements based on the nature of the services. What I found valuable was that taxr.ai specifically addressed my exact situation rather than me trying to interpret general guidelines and possibly getting it wrong.

Wait, how does Claimyr actually work? They somehow get the IRS to call you back faster? That sounds impossible with how backed up the IRS phone lines are.

Yeah right. Nothing can make the IRS move faster. I've literally tried calling them 12 times about an issue with my refund and never got through. This sounds like a scam that just takes your money and then you still wait forever.

It uses an automated system that continually redials the IRS for you and secures a spot in the callback queue. Instead of you personally sitting on hold for hours, their system does the waiting, and when it reaches a real person, it connects the call to your phone. It's basically like having a digital assistant repeatedly call until they get through. I was totally skeptical too. But after wasting multiple days trying to reach someone, I figured it was worth a shot. I got a callback in about 1.5 hours, and the IRS agent was able to answer all my questions about reporting bartering income. It saved me an enormous amount of time and frustration.

That's an interesting perspective! In our case though, there was definitely an established hourly rate. They track my hours precisely and deduct exactly $15 per hour from our tuition bill. The statements even say "Work credit: 12 hours at $15/hr = $180 deduction." So I think in my case it's clearly compensation rather than voluntary work with a thank you gift.

That's definitely different from what my wife experienced. With that specific hourly tracking and direct correlation between hours worked and tuition reduction, it sounds like a clear employment or contractor relationship. The school should definitely be providing you with tax documentation, either a W-2 if you're an employee or 1099-NEC if you're a contractor.

This is exactly what my daughter's preschool does! They call it "tuition remission" and there's actually a $5,250 tax-free benefit allowance for educational assistance programs if the school sets it up properly under Section 127 of the tax code. Anything above that amount would be taxable though.