Please note that this post was published for tax year 2015.
Entering undocumented fellowship income into TurboTax is slightly unintuitive, but the steps below will show you how.
1. Under the ‘Federal Taxes’ and ‘Deductions & Credits’ tab, press ‘Continue.’
2. On the ‘Let’s check for tax breaks’ page, select ‘Jump to the full list.’ Scroll down to ‘Education’ and press ‘Show more.’ Select ‘Start’ for ‘Expenses and Scholarships (Form 1098-T).’
3. Counter-intuitively, to enter undocumented fellowship income, select ‘Yes’ on the section regarding higher education expenses.
4. Enter your proper personal information on the next three screens.
5. To enter undocumented fellowship income, say that you did not receive a 1098-T (but if you did receive one for other scholarship and fellowship information, say yes and enter the information from the form).
By default, universities are supposed to issue each student a 1098-T. TurboTax wants you to verify that you qualify for an exception to that rule. The most likely reason that a grad student receiving a stipend would not receive a 1098-T is that he had more scholarship/fellowship income than qualified education expenses.
6. Click through the next several screens, entering your proper information. (I’m skipping the expenses section for now because I’m focusing on the fellowship stipend income. However, if you have any relevant education expenses you should enter them at this point at this point.)
7. Finally, we arrive at the Scholarships and Financial Aid page – click ‘Continue.’
8. On the next screen, say ‘Yes,’ enter the amount of your undocumented fellowship/scholarship information under ‘Other Scholarships/Grants/Fellowships,’ and press ‘Continue.’
9. Enter your proper information on the next screen.
10. Next, TurboTax asks what you used this fellowship/scholarship information for. The hypothetical grad student didn’t pay room and board, etc. with this fellowship, so his answer is ‘No.’ If you did, just enter your information here. (For what it’s worth, I also answered ‘Yes’ at this stage to test it out, and it didn’t affect the outcome.)
11. Enter your proper information on the next three screens.
12. Next, TurboTax gives you the option to enter the information for another student.
13. TurboTax concludes that you can’t claim an education deduction or credit, which is what we expected as our intention was to report additional income.
That’s it!
Check: Under tabs ‘My Account’ and ‘Tools,’ click ‘View Tax Summary’ and then ‘Preview My 1040’ to verify that the income you entered was added to the correct line on your tax return.
Parent post: Grad Student TurboTax Guide: 2016 Edition
We at Grad Student Finances are not tax professionals, and none of the content in this section should be taken as advice for tax purposes.
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Hi! Do you know how to report non-reported PhD fellowship stipends for state taxes in Turbotax? I am handling the federal tax just fine, but it’s hard to know how to report my fellowship to the State of New York. Thanks!
Hi BD! I’m sorry that I don’t have the resources at this point to delve into how to report fellowship income in each state individually. However, I encourage you to consider preparing your state tax return manually if TurboTax is giving you trouble.
This website is incredibly helpful – thank you for doing this! It is the best link I could find on these topics – you would think that the IRS and TT would make these things easier, but for reporting our own taxes, we just have to “make do”. I also found some useful information on your old site – http://evolvingpf.com/2014/03/enter-1099-misc-fellowship-income-turbotax/
Thanks! The software part of the 2015 tax guide is a refresh of that old post on EPF and I will keep this site updated yearly as the software evolves (unlike that single post). Just keep in mind that we at GSF are not tax professionals so follow the guide at your own risk. 🙂
Thank you so very much for posting this. This is such a great resource for poor graduate students who need to maximize their tax return / minimize their tax due!
Thanks for your support, Raquelle. Please share the site with your peers!
This was incredibly helpful! However I followed these instructions, with the only difference being that I also had a 1098T to enter, and I am not seeing anything showing up on line 7 or line 21 on my 1040. Do you know what I may have done wrong??
Hmmm, that’s strange. I’m not sure why your income would fail to show up. Two very basic checks:
1) Did TurboTax generate a 1040 (not 1040-EZ or something else)? Line 7 is the correct line on that form but the income would show up elsewhere on other forms.
2) Did you have enough qualified education expenses on your 1098-T (box 1 or 2) to cancel out your scholarship/fellowship income (1098-T Box 5 or undocumented)?
If the software continues to not cooperate with you, you do have the option of preparing your return by hand. If you have a simple financial life, that may be easier than troubleshooting TurboTax!
@Emily I received a 1098-T with tuition and scholarship info and a 1099-MISC for stipend info. The amount in Box 5 of 1098-T differ slightly from Box 3 of 1099-MISC. The first part of your 1099-MISC tutorial in http://www.gradstudentfinances.org/how-to-enter-1099-misc-fellowship-stipend-income-into-turbotax/ seems to suggest filling out the form as if it were a 1098-T, but with the income from Box 3 of 1099-MISC. Is this accurate?
What I tried was first filling out my 1098-T information using your 1098-T tutorial and then filling out the 1099-MISC tax withholding information. When I viewed my 1040 (NOT EZ) summary, I didn’t get anything in Line 7.
Can I fill out the 1098-T as indicated in your tutorial and in the section “Did You Receive a Scholarship or Grant in 2016?” click “Yes” and put the amount in Box 3 of 1099-MISC for “Other Scholarships/Grants/Fellowships”? The item “Scholarships/Grants/Fellowships listed on 1098-T” is automatically filled in with the amount from Box 5 of 1098-T. Thanks!
You should enter the two sources of income separately. Be careful just taking the numbers from your 1098-T, though. You should check them against your student account information to make sure the qualified education expenses are being reported in the correct year.
The amount of money in Box 5 of your 1098-T should be different from the amount in Box 3 of your 1099-MISC as they are reporting different sources of income (scholarship vs. stipend). You’ll need to account for both incomes when you report fellowship/scholarship income. You probably ended up with an educational benefit that you shouldn’t have taken.
I am concerned that item 10 should be yes and all of the stipend payment should be entered. Could you explain why you answered no? My concern stems from the belief that living expenses would be covered under room and board.
Heads up to the community:
I just spent an hour on the phone with Turbotax… Using this method, the fellowship income *will not* be reported on line 1 of 1040 for 2020 using Turbotax. They recommended I report my fellowship under “other income” within “less common income.” Using this approach, my fellowship is reported on line 1 of 1040, but it does not show the “SCH” on that line.
Thanks for the update! This is a very old article, so I’m not surprised that the software has been updated.