Idaho School Choice Tax Credit: CPA, FreeTaxUSA, or DIY Filing?

The Three Filing Paths

Every family claiming the Idaho Parental Choice Tax Credit needs to file an Idaho Form 40 with the credit amount on Line 42. How you get there is a choice between three approaches, each with different costs and trade-offs.

Option 1: Hire a CPA or Tax Preparer

Cost: $250–$500+ per return for a CPA familiar with Idaho's school choice credit.

What you get: Professional preparation of your Form 40, correct placement of the credit on Line 42, attachment of Form 39R (Idaho Supplemental Schedule), and a human who can answer questions if the Tax Commission follows up.

What you don't get: A CPA prepares your return at the end of the year. They don't help you organize receipts throughout the year, verify that purchases qualify before you make them, or set up your TAP account. If you hand a CPA a shoebox of receipts in March, they'll enter the numbers — but they won't tell you that $400 of those receipts are for disqualified expenses until they're sorting through them at their hourly rate.

Best for: Families with complex tax situations (multiple income sources, business income, other credits) who already use a CPA and want the credit folded into their existing return.

Option 2: Tax Software (FreeTaxUSA, TurboTax, H&R Block)

Cost: The market research lists FreeTaxUSA state filing at $15.99; check the provider's current price for the tax year you're filing.

What you get: Guided entry for your Idaho return. Confirm that the software supports the Parental Choice Tax Credit on Form 40, Line 42, for the tax year you're filing.

What you don't get: Tax software does not pre-approve your receipts, verify that expenses qualify under the statute, check whether your curriculum meets the core-subject requirement, or validate your mileage log. If a return is reviewed, the Tax Commission can disallow non-qualifying expenses.

Best for: Families comfortable with self-preparation who have simple returns and well-organized expense documentation.

Option 3: File It Yourself (Paper or Free File)

Cost: Check current paper-filing and free-file availability and eligibility before relying on a $0 filing option.

What you get: Full control over the return without software constraints.

What you don't get: The same gaps as software filing — no pre-filing audit of your expenses, no verification that receipts meet Tax Commission standards, and no professional backing if questions arise.

Best for: Families with simple returns who are confident in their documentation and comfortable reading form instructions.

What None of These Options Cover

The filing method handles the last step — getting the credit onto your Form 40 and submitting the return. But the work that determines whether your credit survives comes earlier:

• TAP account setup and application submission (November–January) — no CPA or software handles this for you
• Receipt organization throughout the year — tracking which expenses qualify, maintaining mileage logs, and keeping subject-aligned documentation
• Expense qualification decisions before purchase — knowing that parent-led instruction doesn't qualify, that tutoring must come from non-family members, and that general supplies are excluded
• Advance payment election (if eligible) — choosing between the one-time advance and the standard annual credit is a strategic decision, not a filing question

Making the Decision

If you're already paying a CPA for your return, ask whether adding the school choice credit changes the preparation fee. You're paying for professional help with the filing itself.

If you're comfortable with software and your expenses are well-organized, compare the current state-filing price and confirm the software supports the Form 40 credit entry for your tax year. The credit entry is Line 42 once you know your approved amount.

Either way, the filing is the easy part. The hard part — organizing expenses, verifying qualification, maintaining documentation — happens all year long, and no filing method does it for you.

The Idaho Parental Choice Tax Credit Parent Guide covers the year-round preparation that sits upstream of your filing method: expense tracking templates, qualification matrices, and the TAP walkthrough that gets you from application to approved credit before your CPA or software ever sees the return.

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