Income tax season winding down

The individual income tax filing season is well underway and those who have yet to file their taxes have until April 18 to do so.

This year, the IRS extended the usual April 15 deadline three days to give taxpayers a few extra days to get their taxes sent in.

Although there is extra time to file taxes this year, Andrea Little of Liberty Tax thinks that it just gives people more time to push filing off.

“I think a lot of the people are pushing off because they know they owe and they’re thinking if they push it off that somehow it will go away,” she said. “People need to understand that tax day is April 18 this year and yeah, it gives you a couple of extra days, but it really doesn’t do anything to wait because you still are going to owe the money. You don’t get an extension on what you owe.”

Little explained that the interest and penalties that occur for late payments will begin after April 18, whether you have an extension or not.

Those who don’t push it off to the last minute are usually the ones who know that they are getting some money back.

“The ones we have seen come in early are the ones who are getting refunds,” Little said. “We’re starting to get the people coming now are owing.”

The IRS expects more than 70 percent of taxpayers to receive tax refunds this year. Last year, the IRS issued 109 million refunds, with an average refund of $2,797.

Although she couldn’t give a definite answer to if she was seeing a similar percentage of refunds for Pahrump filers, she said the early filers were close to that.

This year Little said that she’s seeing her fair share of those who are paying penalties related to the Affordable Care Act, and those fines have jumped up in price over last year.

“Yes, we are seeing people paying penalties for the Affordable Care Act and we’re also seeing people who have to repay advance premium credits because they got too much help from the government for the Affordable Care.”

The penalty for those who remain uninsured is $325 per adult or 2 percent of their household income, whichever is larger, up from $95 last filing season. Next year the fine will jump to $695 dollars per adult, or 2.5 percent of the household income, depending on which one is the higher number.

To expedite the filing process, the IRS is urging people to utilize their online resources as opposed to calling them.

“IRS.gov is the best place for taxpayers to go for information about filing their income tax returns this year,” Koskinen said. “Although we will have more people staffing our phone lines this year, we expect those lines to remain busy so we encourage people to visit the web first as the quickest and easiest way to get assistance.”

The IRS expects more than four out of five returns to be filed electronically, with a similar proportion of refunds issued through direct deposit.

Choosing e-file and direct deposit for refunds remains the fastest and safest way to file an accurate income tax return and receive a refund. The IRS anticipates issuing more than nine out of 10 refunds in less than 21 days.

Contact reporter Mick Akers at makers@pvtimes.com. Find him on Twitter: @mickakers.