Are gas pump attendants tips tax deductible in 2026?
Yes — gas pump attendants are on the IRS tipped occupation list (code 810). Tips in this job are deductible for 2026, up to $25,000, if the customer chose the amount and could have declined.
Treasury Tipped Occupation Code 810 · Transportation and delivery · official title: Gas Pump Attendant
How tipping works in this job
Added in the final regulations, and relevant mainly in the states where drivers are not permitted to pump their own fuel. Tips are small cash amounts handed through a car window, most often in bad weather or when you have done something extra like cleaning a windscreen or checking a tyre. Full-service lanes tip better than self-service ones.
The regulations say: Pump gas for customers at a gas station. May also clean the windshield, check the oil level, or check the tire pressure of the customer’s car in conjunction with the car being refueled. Examples given: Gas pumper.
The thing most likely to disqualify your tips
The full-service price differential is not a tip. Where a station charges more per gallon on the full-service lane, that premium is the station’s pricing for the service — the customer bought it rather than gave it. Only the cash pressed into your hand at the window qualifies.
Check your own numbers
Pre-filled for gas pump attendants. Runs entirely in your browser — nothing is uploaded.
Step 1 — your occupation
Checking for Gas pump attendants (Treasury code 810). This occupation is on the list.
Step 2 — is it actually a tip?
Answer for the money you are asking about. If some of your income is tips and some is service charges, run them separately.
Step 3 — your tips and income
The phase-out runs on modified AGI, which for most people is the same as AGI.
3 questions left to answer.
OBBBA Deductions · obbbadeductions.com
Tips deduction worksheet — tax year 2026
The three tests, as answered
- Does the customer decide the amount? not answered
- Can the customer decline to pay it? not answered
- Is it a mandatory service charge or auto-gratuity? not answered
Answer the 3 remaining questions above for a result.
Watch out for this in your job: The full-service price differential is not a tip. Where a station charges more per gallon on the full-service lane, that premium is the station’s pricing for the service — the customer bought it rather than gave it. Only the cash pressed into your hand at the window qualifies.
Educational estimate only, not tax advice. It runs entirely in your browser and nothing you type is sent anywhere. The deduction is scheduled to expire after tax year 2028.
How this applies to gas pump attendants
This occupation was added in the final regulations and it is relevant almost entirely in the handful of places where drivers are not permitted to fuel their own vehicles. In most of the country the role has not existed for decades. Where it does, an attendant works a forecourt lane handling payment, pumping fuel, and — depending on the station — cleaning windscreens and checking oil and tyre pressure while the tank fills.
Tipping is small, cash, and handed through a car window, and it is driven overwhelmingly by two things: weather and extras. A driver who stays dry in a downpour while someone else fills their tank tips. So does a driver whose windscreen was cleaned without asking, or whose tyre pressure was checked before a long journey. On a mild afternoon with nothing added, most drivers simply take their receipt and go.
Full-service lanes tip better than self-service ones for an obvious reason and a less obvious one. The obvious reason is that there is a person to tip. The less obvious one is that many stations charge more per gallon on the full-service lane, and that price differential is not a gratuity — it is the station charging for the service. Drivers sometimes mention it as though it settled the matter, and the money goes to the station, not to the attendant.
Because everything here is cash in single dollars, arriving many times a shift, no record of it will ever exist unless the attendant creates one. A running shift total is the only practical approach; reconstructing a year from a remembered average will produce a figure that cannot be supported. Stations that route card-terminal tips through payroll are the exception, and where that exists it is worth using.
The three tests, whatever your job
Paid voluntarily
The customer sets the amount and can decline to pay it.
Paid in cash or a cash equivalent
Card payments and mobile payments count.
Received directly or through a tip pool
Both routes qualify.
Questions
- Are gas pump attendants on the IRS tipped occupation list?
- Yes. Gas Pump Attendant is Treasury Tipped Occupation Code 810, in the transportation and delivery category. The regulations describe it as: Pump gas for customers at a gas station. May also clean the windshield, check the oil level, or check the tire pressure of the customer’s car in conjunction with the car being refueled.
- What is the most common reason gas pump attendants lose the deduction?
- The full-service price differential is not a tip. Where a station charges more per gallon on the full-service lane, that premium is the station’s pricing for the service — the customer bought it rather than gave it. Only the cash pressed into your hand at the window qualifies.
- How much of my tips can I deduct?
- Up to $25,000 per return, whatever your filing status. The cap applies first, then the amount is reduced by $100 for every $1,000 of modified adjusted gross income above the threshold for your filing status.
- Does a mandatory service charge count as a tip?
- No. A mandatory service charge or automatic gratuity is not a qualifying tip, and the final regulations confirmed this explicitly. It does not qualify even when the customer cannot decline it — a qualifying tip has to be an amount the customer chose to give.
Related occupations in transportation and delivery
- 801
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You park and retrieve customers’ cars, or manage a parking lot or garage.
- 802
Taxi and rideshare drivers
You drive passengers — as a cab driver, a chauffeur, or on a rideshare app.
- 803
Shuttle drivers
You drive a scheduled shuttle — hotel, airport or rental car — on a fixed route.
Occupation data transcribed from T.D. 10044 — final regulations on occupations that customarily and regularly received tips, Treas. Reg. § 1.224-1(h) table 1, last verified 2026-09-08. Read the regulations.