Yes, I think this comes down to facts and circumstances and we don't know them all.Of course. IF this is an attempt to disguise compensation as a gift. But this does not seem to be the case from all that the Original Poster has provided to us.
But even if they don't take the deduction the employer has avoided payroll tax, and the employee/donee has avoided payroll tax and income tax, assuming this is really compensation, and not a gift.
And I agree that as a DRE there really isn't any difference between personal and business accounts, other than convenience.
At one end of the spectrum is an employee of a Corp or LLC that the parents control, so that there is at least some separation between employer and donor.
At the other end is OP's case where the donor and employer are the same person.
OP has wisely recognized that there could be at least the appearance of an issue here.
Statistics: Posted by MP123 — Sun Jan 05, 2025 11:45 am