Spark Driver tax documents: the Walmart 1099 and your own records

Spark is Walmart’s delivery app, and the tax form comes from Walmart. For 2025, its help page says you receive a Form 1099-NEC or a Form 1099-INT if you earned $600 or more in the year (Spark Driver, 2025 driver tax documents). That 1099 includes all of your 2025 earnings and tips (Spark Driver, 2025 driver tax documents).

An independent contractor is a worker paid outside payroll, who may owe estimated tax because nothing is withheld (IRS, Manage taxes for your gig work). You will not get a W-2 from Spark. The 1099 shows what Walmart paid, while your records show what the work cost you.

The form is in the app by January 31, 2026, or mailed by that date if you did not consent to e-delivery (Spark Driver, 2025 driver tax documents). Paper goes to the home address in your Spark account, and the deadline to update it was January 1, 2026 (Spark Driver, 2025 driver tax documents). You can also ask for a mailed copy later with Mail Document on the same screen.

Walmart’s $600 rule is the one on its 2025 page (Spark Driver, 2025 driver tax documents). Payments made in 2026 face a $2,000 federal line for Form 1099-NEC (Form 1099-NEC instructions (12/2026)), so a weekend driver may see no form next January. Check Walmart’s page for its 2026 rule when it appears.

The IRS view does not move: gig income is taxable even when no form reports it (IRS, Manage taxes for your gig work). A Schedule C is the form where a sole proprietor reports business income and costs, and Spark pay goes there (IRS, Manage taxes for your gig work). Export or screenshot the full year of trip receipts, which replace the 1099 when there is none. Which payers owe which form is set out on the contractor 1099 checklist.

Uber and Lyft put online miles in their tax summaries. Walmart does not; its help page says it does not give drivers mileage summaries (Spark Driver, 2025 driver tax documents). So the log is yours to build, and it carries the largest deduction.

A Spark trip usually starts at a Walmart store or curbside pickup point and ends at a customer’s door. Shop and Deliver orders add time in the aisles, but only the miles count. So the Spark log needs the miles of every store-to-door run, plus what the odometer moved over the whole year (IRS Publication 463).

Trip receipts in the Earnings tab help here, because Publication 463 accepts a receipt or record of delivery as proof of the date of a trip (IRS Publication 463). Spark miles from 2025 run at 70 cents each (IRS standard mileage rates). For 2026, the mileage log checklist explains the rate that changed on July 1 (IRS standard mileage rates).

Each cost has to be ordinary and necessary for the work to be deductible (IRS Publication 334). For Spark, that covers the gear you need to move groceries and parcels in a private car. Keep a receipt for each item, such as:

• Insulated bags for frozen and chilled orders, and a folding cart for cases of water.
• A phone mount, car charger and cables, plus the share of the phone bill used for trips.
• Car loan interest, for the business share, even on the mileage rate (IRS Publication 463).
• Parking and tolls paid on a trip, which go on top of the mileage rate (IRS Publication 463).
• Gas, repairs, insurance and registration, but only if you use actual costs instead of the rate.

Customer tips on Spark orders may qualify for the new deduction. Walmart delivery fits the final rule’s Goods Delivery People group, code 804, which now names app-based delivery (Final tipped occupations rule). Since Walmart’s 1099 includes tips (Spark Driver, 2025 driver tax documents), they meet the IRS condition that a self-employed worker’s tips sit inside a 1099 total (IRS FS-2026-07).

The cap is $25,000 a year from 2025 through 2028, and no more than net income from the work (IRS FS-2026-07). Spark drivers with modified AGI over $150,000, or $300,000 married filing jointly, see it phased down, and the return must carry a valid SSN (IRS, Working Families Tax Cuts for workers). Pull the year’s tip total from the Earnings tab, since the form shows one combined figure.

Two details on the form confuse Spark drivers. Walmart issues the 1099 under your SSN, even if you formed a company with its own EIN (Spark Driver, 2025 driver tax documents). It also drops accents and special marks from your name, since the IRS system does not accept them, and that is not an error (Spark Driver, 2025 driver tax documents).

Self-employment tax is the Social Security and Medicare tax a contractor pays on net earnings, because no employer pays half. The rate is 15.3%, made of 12.4% for Social Security and 2.9% for Medicare (IRS, Self-employment tax). It kicks in once your profit from Spark and any other gig work hits $400 (IRS, Manage taxes for your gig work).

If you also drive for other apps, for example DoorDash or Amazon Flex, keep one log for all of them. A mile driven with two apps open still counts once. Since Walmart withholds nothing, plan for quarterly payments; the self-employed checklist has the dates.

• Spark Driver, 2025 driver tax documents: For 2025, Walmart issues a 1099-NEC or 1099-INT at $600 or more, covering all earnings and tips, in the Spark Driver app by January 31, 2026, under the SSN and without accents; it gives no mileage summary.
• IRS, Self-employment tax: The self-employment tax rate is 15.3%: 12.4% for Social Security and 2.9% for Medicare.
• Form 1099-NEC instructions (12/2026): For tax years beginning after 2025 the 1099-NEC threshold is $2,000, indexed from 2027; the December 2026 revision adds box 1b for cash tips and box 1c for the tipped occupation code.
• IRS, Manage taxes for your gig work: Gig workers file once net self-employment earnings reach $400, report all income even without a Form 1099, may owe quarterly estimated tax or raise W-2 withholding instead, and file Schedule C and Schedule SE.
• IRS Publication 463: Car records show each business use and total miles; a regular route can be recorded once with the date of each trip; sampling is allowed; home-to-regular-workplace trips are commuting; the self-employed deduct the business share of car loan interest; a leased car on the standard rate stays on it for the whole lease.
• IRS standard mileage rates: Business rate: 70 cents a mile for 2025, 72.5 cents for January 1 to June 30, 2026, and 76 cents for July 1 to December 31, 2026.
• IRS Publication 334: A business expense must be ordinary and necessary; inventory includes merchandise, raw materials, work in process, finished products and supplies that become part of the item; beginning inventory is the cost of stock on hand at the start of the year.
• Final tipped occupations rule: The final list names app-based delivery and grocery delivery drivers under Goods Delivery People (code 804) and app-based rideshare under Taxi and Rideshare Drivers (code 802).
• IRS FS-2026-07: Gig workers may deduct up to $25,000 of qualified tips for 2025 through 2028, capped at net business income, only if the tips are inside a 1099-NEC, 1099-MISC or 1099-K total; QBI is permanent; the 1099-K line is over $20,000 and over 200 transactions.
• IRS, Working Families Tax Cuts for workers: Qualified tips are voluntary cash or charged tips; the deduction phases out above $150,000 of modified AGI ($300,000 joint), needs an SSN, and excludes the self-employed in an SSTB and employees of an SSTB employer.