New Accountant Needs Help: § 179 Depreciation Deduction

Already tried the Money Board with no luck....

I just started at a CPA firm a couple of months ago and have only been doing tax returns for two weeks now. Needless to say, I’ve realized that I learned nothing in school and have utterly no clue what I’m doing. My boss is really beginning to lose his patience with me and I’m worried I’ll be fired soon if I don’t get it together in a hurry.

On Tuesday, he told me to do the tax return for one of our clients, a construction company. The only new asset the company acquired this year was a 2014 F350 on November 29, 2013. He told me that before I do the tax return, I’m to make a depreciation schedule for the truck and then an adjusting journal entry in QuickBooks to reflect it. I have never heard of Section 179 until now and have been trying to teach it to myself. I just looked at all the MACRS charts to try and figure this thing out and now I’m more confused than ever! What is the formula I should use? What should my journal entry look like? What should my depreciation schedule look like? Someone please explain this to me like I'm 3.


Here is what I think I’ve determined thus far:
Since the truck is considered a heavy vehicle (over 6,000 lbs.), I can only take a Section 179 deduction of $25,000? Since it is a vehicle, it has a depreciable life of 5 years? Since it was purchased on November 29th, I should use mid-quarter convention on the 5 Year MACRS chart of 5%?

Is any of this sounding right? If so, now what do I do with all of this information to make the depreciation schedule and adjusting journal entry. We use Pro System for tax returns, so I went on the Form 4562 and typed in the date, the truck was purchased, that it had a life of 5 years, and that the guy paid $38,501 for it, then the system spit out all these #’s on the depreciation schedule and I have no clue how they were arrived at. (See attached image where hi-lighted. Ignore red marks.)

When I went to my boss and showed him the depreciation schedule and my adjusting journal entry and what my balance sheet looked like, he became extremely annoyed and told me to pack up my stuff and go home and not to think about coming back through his office doors until I fully understand depreciation. Well, I’ve been out of the office for two days now, due to the office being closed for a snow storm. I’m almost certain the office will be open tomorrow and I STILL have no clue what I’m doing. I think he may fire me tomorrow if I don’t know how to fix this. HELP!!!!