MyFreeTaxes Self-Employed Tax Guide

For Home-Based Child Care Businesses

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Business owner in light blue shirt and dark blue pants providing child care to two children

Small businesses play a critical role in our economy, generating income and wealth that supports the financial needs of entrepreneurs, employees, and their families. However, the costs and stress associated with filing business-related taxes limit the positive financial impacts of self-employment for many entrepreneurs, including home-based child care providers.

United Way created this guide to help more owners of home-based child care businesses easily and accurately file their taxes for free. Designed for both full-time and part-time entrepreneurs, this guide will help you self-prepare your taxes for free using MyFreeTaxes.

This guide has two parts.

Part I: Getting Ready for Tax Season focuses on what you need to know about taxes and how to prepare for tax season.

Part II: Filing Your Return Online offers step-by-step instructions on how to use MyFreeTaxes to complete your return online.

This guide will help you take each step in your tax-filing journey. The layout is in a simple question-and-answer format based on the questions frequently posed by other home-based child care providers. To answer the questions, we drew upon official US Internal Revenue Service guidance (including their audit guide for child care providers).

Review the guide below in PDF and video formats below. If you have questions while preparing your return, please contact our Support team.

Review Guide as a PDF

Click here to view in full-screen mode

Review Guide Videos

Part I: Getting Ready for Tax Season

Part II: Filing Your Return Online