How to get your child's tuition tax credit

If you pay for your children for a private school, kindergarten, section or developmental circles, the state will return you cashback for child development costs

Often parents are faced with the need to send their child to a private kindergarten or school. Services in such institutions are not cheap: a month of kindergarten in Kiev starts from 4 thousand rubles. hrn. Private schools are close in cost to universities - for a month of study in a middle-level institution, you will have to pay from 6-7 thousand rubles. UAH per month. For a year, a round amount runs up that can bring parents to tears. But there is good news: some of the money spent can return to you in the form of a tax rebate. Who is entitled to a cashback for a child's education, what size it can be and how to draw up documents for a refund, read our material.

On what grounds is the tax credit calculated?

Education expenses should not be taxed / istockphoto.com

If you officially work and receive a "white" salary, then you should know that monthly 18% is withheld from it in favor of the state as a tax on personal income. If during the year you had large expenses, it means that your income has decreased. Accordingly, you need to pay less tax on it. However, personal income tax is deducted from the salary automatically, and no one will recalculate it every month, taking into account the employee's new expenses. Therefore, people are given the right to confirm their expenses to the state once a year and return 18% of the tax paid on this amount.

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This mechanism is called a tax rebate, and has been operating in our country for quite some time. The costs on which you can save are mortgages under state programs, paid treatment, charitable contributions and even rental housing (for those who have moved from uncontrolled territories). Education has always been on this list, but earlier the discount applied only to secondary and higher education. Two years ago, the Law “On Amendments to Articles 165 and 166 of the Tax Code of Ukraine” came into force. According to this document, Ukrainians can now return part of the money spent on preschool, extracurricular and general secondary education.

Who can get a refund for the child's studies

Only parents are eligible for the tax credit

Only parents are eligible for tax credit / istockphoto.com

From a legal point of view, the list of institutions for which you can receive a discount, from now on, includes not only private kindergartens and schools. Parents have the opportunity to compensate for the funds spent on the music school, sport sectionsand, swimming pool or schools for the study of foreign languages. The main requirement is that your educational institution is officially registered, has the appropriate license and has passed all the necessary levels of accreditation. At the same time, registration at a section, kindergarten or school must be Ukrainian: the state does not compensate for tuition fees in foreign schools.

The right to cashback for tuition fees is granted if a number of important rules are followed:

the payment was made by the parents or adoptive parents of the child (first degree of relationship), and this is documented. If in the contract with the educational institution the payer includes the child himself (this happens), grandfather or grandmother, godparents, uncles or aunts - in this case, the tax rebate is not provided.
a person applying for a discount must be a tax resident of Ukraine. This means that he has a RNUKPN (registration number of a tax payer registration card) - what was previously called a TIN. It happens that people refuse to receive this number for religious reasons. In this case, you can also count on a discount, but there must be a special mark in the passport.
a person applying for a discount receives income in the form of a salary from the employer. This means that individual entrepreneurs and self-employed persons who work exclusively for themselves cannot issue a cashback for their studies. If you are a sole proprietor, you are entitled to a discount only if you officially have two jobs: for yourself and for “that guy”. In this case, the tax rebate is calculated only on the basis of salary, excluding the income of the sole proprietor.

How to apply for a tax credit for your child's education

The tax credit is accrued this year for the expenses of the previous

Tax credit is charged this year for the previous year's expenses / istockphoto.com

The tax discount is calculated once a year based on the results of the previous calendar year. For example, this year you are eligible to receive cashback for the child's education expenses incurred last year. Nobody will count the year before last and all the rest of the years, so you always need to act on this issue in a timely manner. At the same time, throughout the year you are not limited in time: you can apply for a tax discount until December 31st. However, it is also not worth delaying. The sooner you do this, the faster you will receive your money. By law, the refund must occur within 60 days of the date of application.

You need to apply for a tax rebate at the branch of the State Fiscal Service (State Fiscal Service) at the place of your registration. The application must be accompanied by:

a copy of the passport, RNUKPN and birth certificate of the child
income tax return for the last year indicating the amount of expenses incurred (it must be entered in the corresponding appendix to the return, which is called F3)
certificate from work about income received for the last year and taxes paid
an agreement with an educational institution, a certificate of the number of academic months and the cost of training
payment documents (receipts, receipts) that confirm payment of tuition

Keep all contracts, receipts and receipts when paying for your studies / istockphoto.com

On the basis of these documents, the fiscal service calculates the amount that can be compensated for your tuition fees. At the same time, the amount of the discount cannot be more than the personal income tax rate that the employer paid for you last year. For example, now the personal income tax rate is 18%. If last year you spent $ 20,000 on education and child development UAH, your compensation will be 20,000 * 18% = 3,600 UAH. There used to be a limit on the maximum cashback amount: no more than your annual earnings minus taxes and fees. Now there is no such limit, and you can claim a fifth of the costs from almost any amount.