A Schedule C tax summary your accountant will actually love

Updated: May 11, 2026 · For solo tradespeople filing Schedule C as a sole proprietor.

Year-end ritual for most solo tradespeople: dump a shoebox of receipts and a stack of bank statements on the CPA's desk, then sit through 4 hours of $150/hour billing while they categorize everything. That's $600 — and they're guessing, because you didn't categorize the receipts.

Daily Invoice Maker v5.10's Schedule C summary PDF flips that workflow. Your CPA opens the PDF, sees every Schedule C line pre-filled with totals and source counts, and types numbers into the return in 30 minutes. $150 vs $600. The app pays for itself in the first filing.

What the report contains

One PDF, US Letter, 1-2 pages. The structure mirrors IRS Schedule C exactly.

Part I — Income

• Line 1 — Gross receipts: Sum of all paid invoices + income-typed transactions for the tax year. Source count shown ("47 paid invoices + income transactions").

Part II — Expenses

The report ends with:

• Line 28 — Total expenses (bold, on a dark bar)
• Line 31 — Net profit (loss) (huge green bar, or red if a loss)

The methodology notes

The PDF ends with a "Notes & Methodology" section explaining in plain English:

• The IRS standard mileage rate used and the tax year it applies to
• That meals are halved automatically (50% deductibility rule)
• Categories that don't map directly flow to Line 27a
• Which income source was used (paid invoices, bank transactions, or both) so your accountant can verify no double-counting
• A reminder that this is a summary report, not a tax return — always have a CPA review before filing

This last point matters. The PDF is a worksheet, not a return. We're not generating Form 1040, not signing anything, not advising you on tax strategy. It's a categorized totals worksheet — exactly what your CPA would build for you, just done in 1 second instead of 4 hours.

The double-counting protection

If you mark invoices Paid in the app AND import your bank statements, the same money shows up in both places. Without protection, your gross receipts would inflate ~2× — a flagged-return issue.

The exports include an Income Source radio selector with three options:

• Paid invoices only (default, safest)
• Bank transactions only (use if you exclusively rely on imports)
• Both — advanced (with explicit double-count warning + confirm dialog)

The Schedule C PDF's Notes section documents which source was used so your accountant sees it.

Where it lives

Dashboard → tap Tax Summary → pick the year → click the blue Schedule C PDF button. PDF opens in a new tab. Print, save, or email — whatever you want.

While you're there, you can also export the same year's data to QuickBooks IIF or Xero CSV for your accountant's preferred software.

Frequently asked questions

Is this a tax return I can file directly?

No. The Schedule C PDF is a summary report that helps your accountant prepare your actual return. It's not signed, not filed, not a substitute for IRS Form 1040 with Schedule C attached.

Will this work if I haven't categorized my expenses well?

Partially. Uncategorized expenses flow to Line 27a "Other expenses." If most of your data is in that bucket, your CPA will still need to re-classify. The cleaner your categories, the more useful the report.

Does the report include my mileage?

If you want to see what your accountant is actually filling in, the form and its instructions are on About Schedule C. Matching your own expense categories to those line numbers during the year is the single change that most reduces the back-and-forth in March.

Yes — if you logged mileage with the GPS mileage tracker, it shows up on Line 9 with a detail line that calculates miles × rate.