Guest guest Posted September 19, 2009 Report Share Posted September 19, 2009 It's considered a medical expense if you have a medical diagnosis of celiac disease. Like any medical expense, you can claim the deduction as long as the total of your medical expenses is at least 7.5% of your adjusted gross income. You calculate your food expense by deducting the cost of the "regular" food item from the cost of the gluten free replacement item. Also, if you share the food with others in your household who do not have celiac, you would only be able to claim your share of the food (so, for a family of four with only one person with celiac, you'd be able to claim 1/4 of the food expense). Example. Your adjusted gross income is $40,000; 7.5% of which is $3,000. You paid medical expenses of $2,500. You cannot deduct any of your medical expenses because they are not more than 7.5% of your adjusted gross income. For more info check out irs.gov and: http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p502.pdf -----Original Message----- From: Louise Audell <louise_gd@...> Celiac Bay Area < > Sent: Sat, Sep 19, 2009 8:30 am Subject: [ ] Celiac Tax Deduction I heard a portion gluten-free foods can be written off on our taxes now. I'd like to take advantage of this for 2010. I think it involves saving recipes, getting/using a form, and having an official notice/declaration from a doctor. Is there anything else? Louise Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted September 19, 2009 Report Share Posted September 19, 2009 I have not checked the specifics myself…but I think when I mentioned it to my acct. he said that you need to save receipts, do a cost comparison for market value of the non-gf food item to the cost of the item you purchased, and all the variances need to add up to more than 5k a year to make it deductible. The IRS site says it has to ‘exceed ‘7.5% of your adjusted gross income’ http://www.irs.gov/taxtopics/tc502.html From: [mailto: ] On Behalf Of Louise Audell Sent: Saturday, September 19, 2009 8:30 AM Celiac Bay Area Subject: [ ] Celiac Tax Deduction I heard a portion gluten-free foods can be written off on our taxes now. I'd like to take advantage of this for 2010. I think it involves saving recipes, getting/using a form, and having an official notice/declaration from a doctor. Is there anything else? Louise Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted September 19, 2009 Report Share Posted September 19, 2009 You MUST have a formal diagnosis, a prescription from your doctor for GF food, AND you MUST spend OVER 7% of your income on GF foods. This INCLUDES the difference between a regular loaf of bread and a GF one. So, you have to go to the store, see how much each non GF item is, then right off the difference. It is rare, BTW for anyone to actually spend over 7% of their income on solely GF items. Things naturally GF do not count. You can ONLY count the specifically made GF items. In short, probably not worth it – I know a number of other people have looked into this option and ended up not doing it because of that. From: [mailto: ] On Behalf Of Louise Audell Sent: Saturday, September 19, 2009 8:30 AM Celiac Bay Area Subject: [ ] Celiac Tax Deduction I heard a portion gluten-free foods can be written off on our taxes now. I'd like to take advantage of this for 2010. I think it involves saving recipes, getting/using a form, and having an official notice/declaration from a doctor. Is there anything else? Louise Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted September 19, 2009 Report Share Posted September 19, 2009 Oops – it USED to be 7%. Apparently it is now 7.5%. My bad. From: [mailto: ] On Behalf Of Lillyth Denaghy Keogh-Quillan Sent: Saturday, September 19, 2009 2:08 PM Subject: RE: [ ] Celiac Tax Deduction You MUST have a formal diagnosis, a prescription from your doctor for GF food, AND you MUST spend OVER 7% of your income on GF foods. This INCLUDES the difference between a regular loaf of bread and a GF one. So, you have to go to the store, see how much each non GF item is, then right off the difference. It is rare, BTW for anyone to actually spend over 7% of their income on solely GF items. Things naturally GF do not count. You can ONLY count the specifically made GF items. In short, probably not worth it – I know a number of other people have looked into this option and ended up not doing it because of that. From: [mailto: ] On Behalf Of Louise Audell Sent: Saturday, September 19, 2009 8:30 AM Celiac Bay Area Subject: [ ] Celiac Tax Deduction I heard a portion gluten-free foods can be written off on our taxes now. I'd like to take advantage of this for 2010. I think it involves saving recipes, getting/using a form, and having an official notice/declaration from a doctor. Is there anything else? Louise Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted September 20, 2009 Report Share Posted September 20, 2009 I believe that many flexible spending plans (FSAs) will let you use pretax dollars. Here's a link to an article that discusses it: http://www.celiac.com/articles/835/1/Flexible-Spending-Accounts-and-Celiac-Disea\ se-by-Dwight-Senne/Page1.html Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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