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Expense tracking

December 14, 2025 03:00PM
I have been mystery shopping for nearly 30 years and have never had an issue with filing my taxes and my 1099 forms in the past. Now the IRS is pulling reports from paypal and declaring that I made more in income than was reported in my filed taxes. The issue is as I tried to explain to them is the paypal amount versus the 1099 amounts will not match up because the paypal payments sent includes reimbursement along with the payment of the shop. Does anyone know of a useful method to track expenses or a program that would be helpful for separating the expenses from the payment?
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December 14, 2025 03:43PM
Excel or free equivalent. Track fees and reimbursements separately.
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December 14, 2025 04:03PM
I track every job in Google Sheets (their Excel). I report pay+reimbursement as earnings, then deduct costs, milage, supplies, etc. I sum payments by each MSC from my bank statements and PayPal to make sure it matches the spreadsheet. Have they given you the opportunity to share your documentation yet?
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December 14, 2025 05:14PM
I met with them on Friday and was told that I need to somehow print off the jobs in my shop logs for completed shops and then highlight the expenses for the shops to show that the remainder is what I actually earned on the job. By the way....they are talking about my 2022 taxes filed which is very irritating since I have never had an issue with my taxes all these years.
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December 15, 2025 12:07AM
sabrinaw214, I sure hope it all works out for you!

Shopping Arkansas, Louisiana, & Mississippi.
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December 15, 2025 02:44AM
yes I am using Google Sheets (excel like app) and running separate tab for that with mileage.

Shopping Eastern Pennsylvania since 2009
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December 17, 2025 02:17PM
I have a spreadsheet with columns for:
Mileage
Date
Store/Location
Company
Fee
Reimbursement Amt
Bonus

I used to track pay dates as well but got lazy, now I just highlight the rows of the shops I have gotten paid for.
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December 17, 2025 04:03PM
I kept the records in the Numbers app that was pre-installed on my iPhone. I kept track of all expenses including for the reimbursement only companies. Those expenses offset the small profits from others. I only do restaurant and convenience store shops so most are reimbursement only or max $15 profit.

Fortunately, PayPal reporting is changing for 2025 to the old 1099 reporting rule of 200 transactions and over $20k. I certainly won’t exceed that unless they count using my PayPal debit card as a transaction. I’ll have to verify that those don’t count. Still can’t imagine I’ll be near $20k unless I start ebay selling again.
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January 02, 2026 08:13AM
Can you not go to the individual MSC and print off their invoice? For instance, in Shopmetrics, the MSC will list the reimbursement separately on its own line, unless it's Grace Hill, when they were deducting the $10 for the report writing that Pam lady was doing for some shoppers.

In Sassie, filter out for the whole year and maximize the item. I did that and attached my bank statement.

But I also go a step further and print the first page, which shows the rate, address, and reimbursements. I'm too thorough. Some lady on Facebook a few years ago went into detail about how she did her stuff, I just followed it.

@sabrinaw214 wrote:

I met with them on Friday and was told that I need to somehow print off the jobs in my shop logs for completed shops and then highlight the expenses for the shops to show that the remainder is what I actually earned on the job. By the way....they are talking about my 2022 taxes filed which is very irritating since I have never had an issue with my taxes all these years.
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January 12, 2026 01:17PM
I use Google Sheets. It's convenient because you can access from your phone and I can add information like mileage on the fly. I color coat everything by company which makes it easier to track. Don't forget you can go back to mystery shopping companies and collect your reimbursement information as well. I keep a combination of digital and paper records for everything that I am getting paid for monthly.

As an example for November, I print out my month end information from Sheets that has ms/company, store, address, mileage, Pay, reimbursements, expenses/tolls, total mileage driven, and total mileage reimbursements (IRS) and then I go to each Mystery shopping company I worked for that month and I put in November 1, 2025-November 30, 2025 and I expand each shop to show pay and reimbursements and print that off and put that in my "year end binder for 2025. "
I also put any receipts in that binder for expenses I have during the month and then I place my hard copies that I take with me in the field in a file cabinet that has a printout of whatever I have as evidence that I was there at that time at that place such as a receipt, photo of the business, business cards ect. to establish I was there at that time and place. I'd rather be over prepared then under prepared.
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