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Part of Four calendars behind tax deadlines, compared side by side
5 points on tax deadlines rules that matter
Tax date rules sit in four layers that move at four speeds. Learn how to tell a real change from a misquoted relief announcement before it costs you.
This page deliberately does not list deadline dates, because they move every filing year and vary by state, so the current ones sit with the IRS and with your state revenue department.
What this page does is name the layer of authority that set a date, which decides how far the date can move.
This site covers business tax, deductions, and mileage. A deduction or a mileage claim is only as strong as the date and the record behind it. The filing deadline decides when the return is due. The payment deadline decides when the tax is due, separately.
For mileage, the log that supports the deduction has to be made when the trip happens, not after a deadline moves. For a business deduction, the receipt or record has to exist before you claim it. A moved filing date does not create records you did not keep.
Check the deadline that applies to the specific deduction, payment, or election you are using.
What to take away
- Four layers set tax datesstatute, regulations, administrative guidance, and publications. Each moves at its own speed.
- A change has an effective date, an openable source, and a stated audience. A claim missing any of the three is rumor.
- Filing and payment are separate obligations that share a page and carry separate penalties.
- Relief announcements are narrow by geography and event. The narrowness is what gets dropped in retelling.
- Confirm your own dates with the IRS or your state revenue department, and take your return to a licensed CPA, enrolled agent, or tax attorney.
The four layers, and how to tell which one you are reading
The four layers
| Layer | What it is | How fast it moves | How to check it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Statute | The law a legislature passed | Rarely, with notice | The bill text and its effective date |
| Regulations | The detailed application of the statute | Occasionally | The regulation number in the Federal Register |
| Administrative guidance | Bulletins, notices, announcements | Continuously | The notice number on the agency site |
| Publications and instructions | The agency explaining the above | Annually, per filing year | The tax year printed on the cover |
Almost everything you read online summarizes the bottom row, which summarizes the three above it. That is fine for orientation and useless as authority.
Four Layers of Tax Authority
Layer
- Statute
- Rarely
- Regulations
- Occasionally
- Administrative guidance
- Continuously
- Publications
- Annually
Speed
- Statute
- Bill text
- Regulations
- Federal Register
- Administrative guidance
- Notice number
- Publications
- Tax year on cover
How to Check
- Statute
- Regulations
- Administrative guidance
- Publications
The IRS page on the tax code, regulations and official guidance shows how the layers rank. Send it to anyone who insists a blog post settled something. The page title is Tax Code, Regulations and Official Guidance.
The checklist for a real change
Run any claim about a moved deadline through these five questions before you act on it.
Checklist for a real change
- What is the number on the notice, announcement, or bill that made the change?
- Who issued it, and what is its effective date?
- Which taxpayers does it name, and which areas does it cover?
- Does it move the filing date, the payment date, or both?
- Which tax year does it apply to?
Five Questions Before Acting
- Effective date, not just publication date?
- Can you open the source?
- Does it say who it applies to?
- Does it separate filing from payment?
- Does your agency mail confirm it?
A claim that fails any of these is not a change yet. It is a summary of a change, written by someone who read a summary.
What moves, and what does not
Stable for years. The structure: that returns exist, that estimated payments exist, that employment deposits run on their own schedule, that an extension addresses filing rather than payment.
Reissued every filing year. The specific dates, which shift for weekends and holidays, and every figure attached to them.
Quiet, and specific to you. Your assigned state rates, your deposit schedule if your circumstances changed, and state dates set by individual departments.
Announced and widely misread. Disaster relief and other event-specific relief. It is the most misquoted category in tax coverage.
What a misread date costs
| Charge | How it is figured | Ceiling |
|---|---|---|
| Failure to file | 5% of the unpaid tax per month, or part of one | 25% |
| Failure to pay | 0.5% of the unpaid tax per month, or part of one | 25% |
| Both in one month | The failure to file charge is cut by the failure to pay charge | 47.5% combined |
| Interest | The federal short-term rate plus 3 percentage points, compounded daily | Runs from the original due date |
The rates come from the statute. The dollar figures attached to them are indexed for inflation and reissued every year.
Interest starts on the original due date, not the date you file. An extension to file does not extend the time to pay. The failure to pay charge doubles to 1% per month after the IRS issues a notice of intent to levy.
Worked example: checking a claim that a deadline moved
Suppose someone tells you the quarterly estimated payment for your area moved to a later date.
IRS Notice 2020-18, issued March 13, 2020, moved the federal income tax filing and payment due date from April 15, 2020 to July 15, 2020. Notice 2020-23, issued April 6, 2020, widened that relief to other returns and payments due on or after April 1, 2020.
The state layer moved only where a state said so: California's Franchise Tax Board announced the same July 15, 2020 date for individuals, and other states set their own.
Then run the claim through the steps.
Checking a claim that a deadline moved
- Ask for the announcement. If there is none, stop.
- Open it and find the effective date.
- Find the covered area. If your county is not listed, the original date stands.
- Find the covered taxpayer. Relief often names individuals and households, not every business in the ZIP code.
- Check whether the relief covers filing, payment, or both.
- Write down what you concluded, the source, and the date you read it.
Steps three and four are where most people get it wrong.
Reading an authority's own page
- Identify which body you are on. Federal and state pages look alike in a search result and are not interchangeable.
- Find the tax year the page applies to. That is different from when the page was last updated.
- Find your entity type and your situation. Nearly right is the most expensive kind of wrong here.
- Separate what must be filed from what must be paid.
- Follow the link to the instructions. The summary orients you; the instructions govern.
For the state half there is no shortcut and no national reference. The IRS maintains a directory of state government tax sites, which at least gets you to the right department without a search engine in the way. The directory is titled State Government Websites.
Where to find this year's dates
Publication 509, Tax Calendars, lists the federal due dates for filing returns, paying tax, and making estimated payments for the current filing year. Publication 505, Tax Withholding and Estimated Tax, covers the estimated payment rules. Publication 15 (Circular E), Employer's Tax Guide, carries the employment deposit schedule.
For state dates, go to the state revenue department's own calendar. No national page replaces it.
Where the other layers are covered
The tax deadlines overview covers how the calendar behaves in practice. The employment schedule, which runs on its own logic, is in payroll tax. The state layer is in state business tax, and what your entity is, which decides which rules apply at all, is in entity tax treatment.
Common questions
Why does this page not list the dates for the year?
Because it would be a copy of a source that is authoritative and free, and a copy goes stale silently. Read the authority's page and you will always have the current version.
Someone told me a deadline moved. How do I check?
Find the announcement itself, check who it applies to, and check the effective date. Most claims of this kind are relief for a specific area being repeated without that detail.
Do state dates follow federal ones?
Often, and not always, and not for every tax. Each state decides for itself, which is why the state half of the calendar has to be built state by state.
How far ahead can I plan?
The structure, indefinitely. The specific dates, one filing year at a time.
