When to claim Giving Tuesday donations for tax year - donation date or receipt date?

What if you set up recurring donations? Do you claim them based on when each payment gets processed throughout the year?

For recurring donations, you claim each payment in the tax year when it's actually processed. Each individual payment is considered a separate donation for tax purposes, so if you set up monthly donations, you'd claim each one based on when it was processed during the year. If your December recurring donation somehow gets processed in January of the next year, then that specific donation would count for the new tax year, not the previous one.

Does this tool actually work with donation receipts specifically? Like can you upload your charity receipts directly and it figures out which tax year they belong to?

I'm kinda skeptical about using third-party services for tax stuff. Couldn't you just call the IRS and ask them about this donation timing issue directly?

Yes, it works specifically with donation receipts. You can upload the PDFs directly and it analyzes the dates and payment methods to determine the correct tax year for claiming them. It's particularly helpful when you have multiple receipts with different dates like in this situation. The IRS is notoriously difficult to reach by phone, especially during tax season. I tried calling them about a similar issue last year and was on hold for over an hour before giving up. This tool gives you direct references to IRS publications so you know the information is reliable.

How does this actually work? Isn't this just like paying someone to wait on hold for you? Seems weird that this would be faster than calling yourself.

This sounds like BS honestly. The IRS phone system is the same for everyone. How could a service possibly get through faster than I could on my own? Sounds like you're just advertising something.

It's not someone waiting on hold for you - they use a system that monitors the IRS phone queues and automatically connects you when an agent becomes available. You get a call back only when there's actually someone ready to talk, so you don't waste time on hold. I was skeptical too! But their system actually works - they have dedicated connections that continuously monitor IRS queue status across multiple call centers. The IRS phone system has different wait times at different facilities, and their system finds the shortest queue. I'm not affiliated with them at all, just sharing what worked when I needed clarification on my donation timing issue.

But wouldn't that mean some December donations would get pushed to the next tax year? Seems like you'd lose out on deductions for a whole year that way.

That's a good point about potentially delaying your deduction. My situation is usually the opposite - most of my donations happen early in the year, so I'm not usually crossing tax years. For December donations, you might want to confirm with the charity when they'll process it. Some larger organizations will process December donations before year-end specifically for tax purposes, even if the money doesn't reach the final program until January.

You should ONLY claim your personal contribution amount, not the employer match! The matching amount is a donation from your employer, not from you. If you claim the matched amount, you could definitely get flagged in an audit.

Thanks for clarifying that! I've been doing it correctly then - only claiming my personal contribution and not the employer match. That makes sense since the company probably gets the tax deduction for their portion.