Qualified Plug-in Electric Drive Motor Vehicle Credit credit concern

Aug 27, 2015 2 Replies

In order to claim credit on Qualified Plug-in Electric Drive Motor Vehicle Credit you need to be the owner of the vehicle. What if the vehicle was purchased by a shareholder of a s corp, can the s corp claim credit the Qualified Plug-in Electric Drive Motor Vehicle Credit when the vehicle was 50% used by the business?


It depends. Is the corporation recording everything about the vehicle on the company books? Is the shareholder showing taxable fringe benefit on the W-2 for personal use of company vehicle?

Are there other shareholders? Is this just an attempt to allocate one person's credit to others (via S-corp pass-through)? If not, why does it matter who gets the credit, S-corp or individual?

In an audit, IRS might object (disallow) if the vehicle titled to the individual.

In a different forum where you posed this question you indicated that -

  1. The vehicle belongs to your Dad
  2. You use the vehicle 50% in your S-Corporation business, and
  3. Dad is not also a shareholder in the S-Corporation.

If those facts are correct then the conclusion that you obtained on the other forum is correct, i.e. only Dad can claim the hybrid credit on his tax return at 100% personal use, as he is the owner of the car and did not use it in his business.

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