FAM Trips | Let’s Aggressively Justify A Vacation
You just got back from a FAM trip. Your Instagram looks like a resort brochure. Your tan is immaculate. Your credit card statement is, let's say, significant. And now you're sitting here at 11pm staring at QuickBooks, wondering if you can write off the entire thing because you technically took notes on your phone between spa appointments.
Narrator voice: she could not write off the entire thing.
But here's the twist. She might be able to deduct more than she thinks.
The question everyone's too scared to ask
What you actually want to know is this. If I had fun on this trip, does that disqualify it?
And the answer is more interesting than "yes" or "accidentally commit light tax fraud." Because the IRS already knows you had fun. They know it looks like a vacation. They also know travel advisors genuinely have to experience destinations to sell them well.
So they wrote rules. Annoying, specific, weirdly vague rules that live in the gray area between real work and what your high school guidance counselor would have called living your best life.
What this week's episode covers
On this week's Carry-On Advice, I'm breaking down:
The primary purpose test, and why it decides almost everything
What actually counts as a "business day" (spoiler: checking email poolside is not it)
Why your flight might be fully deductible while your dinner is only half, or not at all
The documentation you need so an audit is boring instead of terrifying
How to stop being so conservative that you're quietly overpaying
Because here's the plot twist nobody expects. Most travel agents I work with don't write off enough. They're so afraid of doing it wrong that they're essentially tipping the IRS for the privilege of underestimating themselves.
The thing I'll tell you straight
The line between a legitimate business trip and a vacation you're aggressively justifying is not as blurry as you think. You know when you're working. You know when you're not. The IRS knows too.
But there's a real difference between a structured FAM trip with site inspections, supplier presentations, and networking, and calling your girls' trip to Tulum a research opportunity because you stayed at one resort you might mention to a client someday.
The trick is knowing which is which, and then documenting it so you're not spiraling every February.
Listen if you've ever
Wondered if the sunset champagne counts as a deductible meal (it doesn't, but something else on that trip probably does)
Come home from a FAM with zero receipts and full panic
Been too scared to deduct anything because "what if the IRS comes for me"
Mixed three vacation days into five business days and had no idea what that did to your write-offs
Wanted someone to just answer the question instead of saying "consult a tax professional" and walking away
This is ten minutes of straight answers, minus the tax jargon that makes you want to throw your laptop into the ocean. Which, by the way, would not be deductible.
Grab your receipts. Let's go.
Amanda Collaso | The Smart Assets Podcast Where we talk about money like adults who also have emotional breakdowns in Target
