Individuals who own foreign entities typically have complex returns. I prepare returns for three such individuals; they’re all on extension. Yet one item needed to be prepared for these individuals by April 18th: the new Section 965 transition tax.
One of the key issues with the §965 tax is that you needed to make an election by April 18th to elect to make your payment in eight equal installments. If you didn’t make the election, you owed all the tax with your 2017 tax filing–ouch! This was a difficult deadline for many individuals due to the complexity of their returns.
Luckily, the IRS today announced penalty and filing relief on the §965 tax. As the IRS noted,
• In some instances, the IRS will waive the estimated tax penalty for taxpayers subject to the transition tax who improperly attempted to apply a 2017 calculated overpayment to their 2018 estimated tax, as long as they make all required estimated tax payments by June 15, 2018.
• For individual taxpayers who missed the April 18, 2018, deadline for making the first of the eight annual installment payments, the IRS will waive the late-payment penalty if the installment is paid in full by April 15, 2019. Absent this relief, a taxpayer’s remaining installments over the eight-year period would have become due immediately. This relief is only available if the individual’s total transition tax liability is less than $1 million. Interest will still be due. Later deadlines apply to certain individuals who live and work outside the U.S.
• Individuals who have already filed a 2017 return without electing to pay the transition tax in eight annual installments can still make the election by filing a 2017 Form 1040X with the IRS. The amended Form 1040 generally must be filed by Oct. 15, 2018. See the FAQs for details. For more information about the transition tax and other tax reform provisions, visit IRS.gov/taxreform.
The FAQs noting this are available on the IRS website.
Do note this is not complete relief. Many taxpayers impacted by this will owe interest from April 15th; you also have to owe less than $1 million in transition tax. But it does allow many taxpayers to proceed in an orderly manner in determining what tax they will owe on Section 965 rather than rushing to meet a deadline. (Individuals outside of the US have until next Friday to timely file their returns. They can now file extensions and still, in many cases, elect the installment treatment for this tax.)
Tags: Section.965