How do Pastors classify telephone expenses?

I received a great question today from a pastor in IL – “Do our phone expenses fall under housing allowance or professional expense reimbursement?”

Pastors deduct ministry calls as professional expenses or use them to substantiate their church or ministry expense allowances. This includes all long distance calls for ministry and even local calls on a dedicated phone line. (You need at least one phone that you can call “personal.”) All the rest of a pastors personal phone costs can be used to substantiate his housing allowance as non-taxable income received from his ministry.