Make sure your church and other charitable contributions will be allowed by the IRS.
The IRS is repeatedly and often referring to a tax court case (Durden v. Comr. T.C. Memo 2012-140) in which charitable contributions were disallowed even though the taxpayer had a receipt from the church. The receipt that the organization provided its contributors did not state that “the taxpayer received no goods or services from the charitable organization.” In this case, the taxpayer did not receive any goods or services. The deduction was disallowed!
For Taxpayers
You need to ask your charitable organization to add this to their receipts for charitable contributions if it is not already stated on the receipts. Be certain to get a new receipt before a return is filed. You will need this receipt before the return is filed.
For Nonprofits
Since the phrase “the taxpayer received no goods or services from the charitable organization” is standard on most charitable donation receipts for most organizations, it is sometimes easy to leave off when doing a receipt in special situations, many times involving noncash gifts. It is very important that all nonprofit organizations make sure this statement is on all receipts/letters where this is truly the case.
For charitable organizations, this statement needs to be added to the receipts/contribution statements that you provide to contributors for charitable contributions if it is not already stated on the receipts. This receipt is needed by the contributor before he or she files a return.