Baby grace period?

[Janitor Bob]

Client had a baby this past January 3rd, 2012. She told me tonight that she wants to take advantage of the "baby grace period". She said that a friend told her (I know...here we go!) that there is a 10-day grace period after you have a baby during which time you can pretend, for tax purposes, that you had the baby on 12/31

[Yardley CPA]

Baby Grace Period? Nope...no such thing. It's my understanding that the baby needs to be born from January 1 through Dceicember 31 in order to be taken as a dependant.. You should have pretended that you didn't hear your client when they said that.

[Pacun]

Not such an animal. Babies need to be born on Dec 31 or before in order to be claimed.

[JohnH]

I'm pretty sure that baby grace period only applies if your return is prepared by a qualified & licensed hair stylist or auto mechanic.

[Jack from Ohio]

Or prepared on a melting ice pack in the arctic with polar bears as witnesses. Al Gore established the grace period. She will have to get a written statement from him that claiming the baby in 2012 instead of 2011 will create too much carbon dioxide, and the offset credits will pay the additional tax she would have owed.

[jainen]

>>a 10-day grace period<<

The problem goes back to Creation. It seems things didn't fit exactly together, so the way the earth spins does not evenly match its orbit around the sun. It's not off by much, but it adds up.

In 1582 His Grace Pope Gregory XIII bumped everything forward 10 days. It works out that if your baby was born during the first ten days on the Gregorian calendar, it was within the last ten days on the old calendar from Julius Caesar. The IRS is not allowed to favor one religion over the other, so if you file by April 5th you should be fine.

[Trnr395]

ha ha nice.....I had this same question last year I think. Crazy what people will believe, client had a friend who took an accounting class once...and as stated by my client "She is very smart with this stuff" love it!!

[Jack from Ohio]

I'm pretty sure that baby grace period only applies if your return is prepared by a qualified & licensed hair stylist or auto mechanic.

Don't forget barber or bartender....

[Don in Upstate NY]

The problem goes back to Creation. It seems things didn't fit exactly together, so the way the earth spins does not evenly match its orbit around the sun. It's not off by much, but it adds up.

In 1582 His Grace Pope Gregory XIII bumped everything forward 10 days. It works out that if your baby was born during the first ten days on the Gregorian calendar, it was within the last ten days on the old calendar from Julius Caesar. The IRS is not allowed to favor one religion over the other, so if you file by April 5th you should be fine.

And years from now, someone will google this up and the rumor will start afresh ...

[jklcpa]

lol, I thought the original question might be a joke, sorry JB. Anyway, it made my day to see that jainen posted something humorous.

I think jainen is wrong on one point though. The Pope should be addresses as "His Holiness". "His Grace" would be appropriate to an archbishop and more than insulting. Does anyone remember when Pres "W" greeted the Pope with "Your Eminence, you're looking well" (title would be used when greeting a Cardinal) or when he said "Thank you, your holiness, awesome speech" ?

[jainen]

>>"His Grace" would be appropriate to an archbishop<<

Yes, I did feel uncomfortable writing it that way. But I had to use the word "grace" as part of the joke. I didn't want to make it longer with a whole nother sentence just for the one word, so I took a bit of poetic license.

[JohnH]

Well, "grace" and "license" don't belong in the same sentence either, but that's a whole other paragraph (maybe even a book or two). :)

[jainen]

.."grace" and "license" don't belong in the same sentence<<

What do you have against funding for higher education, John? http://www.grace.edu...-license-plates