My Mileage Tracking Secret!

Tax season is among us right now and on the blog this week I’m dedicating all my posts to sharing some of my favorite apps, tips, and tricks that help get me through this season! As a creative, numbers and percentages are the last thing I want to be thinking about. The less I have to do during this season to be fully prepared, the happier I feel!

Today, I’m sharing my FAVORITE way to track mileage! If you drive your car for business purposes you can deduct every mile you drive for work, with the current deduction rate at 57.5 cents/mile. So whether you are running an errand, heading to a meeting or picking up supplies you are missing out on valuable savings if you are not tracking your mileage!

I used to carry around this little black Moleskin notebook to write down all the driving I did. I would do my best to leave it in the glove compartment of my car and whenever I was about to go somewhere, I was supposed to write down where I was going, jot down my starting mileage and remind myself to catalog the end mileage number after I had finished. The problem was, I would always forget to write down the number when I got home! In a panic, I would then try to retrace my drives in Google Maps to figure out how far I had traveled. This always created extra work that I just did NOT want to do. Then I discovered the ease and simplicity of MileIQ and my life changed forever!

How MileIQ Works
Mile IQ is an app you can download straight to your iPhone or Android device. You program in your vehicle information and turn on “Drive Detection” so the app can pick up when you are driving automatically. Every time you drive somewhere, MileIQ will track that trip. You can then classify the trip as personal (if you are going out to dinner with friends, etc.) or business (running errands, heading to a meeting, etc.) You’re done! No more trying to remember where you went or how far you drove. MileIQ does all the work for you!

Why I Love MileIQ

• Even when the app is closed, drive detection is always on. It takes the worry out of remembering to track.
• Shows you the potential money you could make from every drive!
• Allows you to separate personal and business drives easily. A map of your drive comes up and you literally swipe left for personal and right for business!
• It allows you to create unique purposes for your drives. They have the standard “Meeting” or “Errand” options but then I can add my own. For me, as a photographer, I’ve added “Photo Shoot” and “Location Scouting” as options.
• MileIQ automatically generates monthly reports of all my drives that I can email to myself! Come tax time, I can print off each report to bring to my accountant! What could be easier?!
• It’s free! You can download MileIQ at no cost to you. Your first 40 drives/month are completely free. If you drive more than 40 times per month (like me) I would suggest upgrading to the paid version (I paid $59.99 for a full year – so cheap, I know!) so you can track an unlimited number of drives.

Find out more about MileIQ to see if it’s the right fit for you and your business! They also put together this incredibly helpful article explaining everything you need to know about mileage deduction. I seriously love using MileIQ, not only for it’s convenience but for that fact that it’s always saving me money without me having to do anything!

A SPECIAL BONUS!
To say thanks for reading this post, if you sign up for MileIQ, you’ll receive a 20% off bonus! Woohoo! Just sign up HERE!