Oct 03 2008
IRS Mileage Reimbursement 2008: Raised Again IF…
In July the IRs raised it’s mileage reimbursement rate a second time for the year. The new rate of $.585 affects all business travel through the end of the year. They also reissued a warning that they will be very closely monitoring how people are recording and justifying these miles.
Their publication #463, How to Prove Expenses clearly states "You cannot deduct amounts that you approximate or estimate." An IRS compliant mileage log would include your destination, miles traveled, and business purpose. While paper logs are still being accepted, IRS Publication 463 also says, “If you prepare a record in a computer memory device with the aid of a logging program, it is considered an adequate record.”
The potential benefit of this change for any business or individuals who travel for business are huge. For those who travel the most taking full advanatage of the IRS mileage allowance could mean thousands of dollars back in their pockets.
The rub is making sure you log all of your business miles the way the IRS wants you to. If you forget to record the odometer readings and try to guesstimate or approximate it later, you could risk losing your mileage reimbursement for all the trips you did record correctly if you are audited. That leads many people to underreport their business miles and leave money on the table that should rightfully be theirs.
From a business management perspective, accurating logging business miles has implications that go far beyond correct accounting and payouts. If employees are left to figure their own mileage and you accept whatever documentation they provide, you could not just come up short if your business is targeted for an IRS audit. You could be paying thousands, or tens of thousands of dollars for "fudged" reports.
Fortunately there are some more reliable means of collecting and managing your business mileage logs including a completely automated mileage logger that you plug in to your vehicle’s cigarette lighter and forget about. It’s a portable GPS enabled device that logs every mile your vehicle travels and transmits it to a secure online account for you.
This mileage logger is just one of the gas mileage calculators you need to help you measure, so you can manage rising cost of fuel. You can find more information on it at www.GasMileageCalculators.com
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