2009 Tax Filing Guidance

Federal Return

When preparing your Federal return you may list your GRACE contribution as a charitable contribution in Schedule A of your Federal return.

The Grace contribution does not affect your ability to file the Federal return electronically. Keep the form received from GRACE (IT-QEE-SSO1) along with the other records you maintain.

State Return

Make sure you have the pre-approval form you received from the State (IT-QEE-TP1) as well as the Form sent from GRACE (IT-QEE-SSO1). The final form you need to fill out is GA Form IT-QEE-TP2. You may download this from the GRACE web site www.gracescholars.org

If you included the GRACE donation as a charitable donation on your Federal Schedule A then you must adjust your Georgia Adjusted Gross Income. Listing the GRACE contribution on Form GA 500 Schedule 1 line 4 can do this. That amount ultimately increases your Georgia Adjusted Gross Income listed on GA Form 500 Line 10.

For all the individuals who wrote a personal check list the GRACE contribution as a credit item on GA Form 500 Schedule 2 line 4. There were only 5-10 GRACE donors who wrote a check from a business checking account. Those donors should use line 6,7 or 8. In that case you need to list what percentage of the Company you/your spouse own (that will be the percentage of the credit you can claim). Companies should work with their tax advisors to ensure proper handling.

The GRACE credit and other credits are summarized at the bottom of Schedule 2 and carried over to GA Form 500 line 17. There is where you can see that the entire amount of your contribution reduces your total tax liability dollar for dollar.

The State of Georgia allows electronic filing for those who have taken an Education Credit. See our Turbo Tax Instructions for assistance in filing electronically with Turbo Tax.

If you file a Georgia return in paper format be sure to attach Forms IT-QEE-SSO1 (sent from GRACE) and IT-QEE-TP2 (identifies the eligible credit amount) to your GA return. Keep the pre-approval Form IT-QEE-TP1 with your records.