Since 2006 the Internal Revenue Service has required that your donated clothes be in “good” or better condition.
Lately, we’ve seen more questions from the IRS about the condition of donated items.
One practice we recommend is to take a picture of the stack of clothes you’re giving away. The photo doesn’t have to be fancy. A cell phone picture will do!
You just want to be able to show that the clothes you’re donating to charity are in good or better shape.
Just look at these jeans! Clean, pressed, and worn only once or twice! They’re not frayed, torn, or old. They are simply too big for us now and we’re giving them away.
With these pictures, we are ready to show the IRS that our gifts were up to the Federal standards! (See IRS Publication 561 on Fair Market Value.) We will store them on our computer along with the financial documents that support the taxes we’ll file next April.
Whatever your record keeping system, consider including some pictures of your charitable gifts, just in case the IRS asks.