Do you use your home to entertain your stock photography clients, models, photo researchers or other business associates? Whether you have at-home gatherings to keep clients or woo new ones, you should be up-to-date on tightened rules for business entertainment deductions.

To qualify for that 50 percent write-off, the home entertaining has to satisfy one of two requirements. It must be "directly related to" (there is a business discussion during the entertaining) or "associated with" (the entertainment directly precedes or follows a substantial and bona fide business discussion) the conducting of business.

There is a noteworthy exception when you are host to a business guest from out of town. You get to deduct entertaining that takes place the day before or after the business discussion.

The entertainment write-off is not limited to a modest meal for yourself and your business guests.

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Despite the restrictions, it remains possible to host a catered affair at your home before or after a business discussion, invite a few friends and deduct 50 percent of your qualifying expenditures.

Example: You are involved in a business venture with Photosharp Enterprises. Photosharp executives come to your office for an afternoon business meeting. Afterward, you invite them and their spouses to a gathering at your home. Also on the guest list are five other couples, who are your personal friends. So, counting yourself and your spouse, a total of 20 people attend the affair.

Because the party directly follows a business discussion, it passes muster as deductible entertainment. And just how much do you get to deduct for the party? No deduction for expenses attributable to those five couples who are not business guests, with a cap of 50 percent on the remaining expenditures.

Assume that the party's total cost runs to $1,000. That means an allowable deduction of $250, which is 50 percent of $500 (the amount left after the total cost of $1,000 is reduced by the $500 allocated to those five couples who are social, as opposed to business acquaintances. In the next column, I will discuss the IRS regulations on lavish business meetings.