ESPP Rollover - Categorizing negative amount

Question

I have an ESPP account which I transfer money to within the paycheck wizard, every time I have a post tax deduction. However, I have one paycheck that shows a negative amount for ESPP and is called "ESPP Rollover".

Is it better to enter this as a negative amount in the post tax decuction section? or to create an Other Income category called ESPP rollover in the Earnings section, and place the positive amount there?

mshiggins · Answer

I don’t believe the paycheck form will allow negative amounts. Whether the amount is negative or positive, it would still use the same category and amounts will show in reports for that category.  I recommend you try both approaches and test out how each impacts your reporting.

harry askenazi · Answer

Im not thinking about tax reporting as much as general reporting. If I want to see what my gross income was, would it not show incorrectly by categorizing this way?

Curious to hear what the downside would be to putting it as a negative number in the post tax deductions area.

mshiggins · Answer

Using the ESPP accumulation account as the category will not show in the tax related reports as income and will not show as income in the Tax Planner.