I love travel and adventure. It inspires me. Every year I attend different conferences as an attendee or as a sponsor to network, grow my business, and attract new clients. The IRS, however, is concerned with the details and validation of a business purpose and that means showing receipts for the purchase price of the conference, the exact dates of the conference to see if they match up with my hotel stay. For a hotel showing a stay in Las Vegas (a big red flag for the IRS), I needed to show the paid receipt for the conference AND a welcome registration letter showing the dates of the conference in Las Vegas – which corresponded to the dates of the hotel stay. All of this was necessary to prove the travel was business related!!! The auditor had to connect the dots, cross the t’s and dot the i’s. The travel was accepted, because I had all the receipts in question.
I subscribe to a daily newspaper, The Philadelphia Inquirer, to keep up to date with Philadelphia businesses, potential clients, etc. If someone I know is promoted, I send a note of congratulations. That’s a good keep in touch strategy. Clients or their clients can be mentioned in newspaper articles, and I let them know. According to the IRS, that particular newspaper is personal in nature and not deductible.