I don't think it's possible to do taxes in January, most places don't have documents ready before the end of the month. I had to wait a few extra weeks for the documents from my investment account too, so not everything is always available on Jan 31.
I did mine in February this year. I'll probably wait and do it later next year, like mid-March, as I ended up missing a document that would have slightly increased my state return (not enough to go through the headache of fixing it).
Last year, I needed an extension, as it was first time doing it myself and my situation was fairly complex.
It depends a lot on the company, my company usually has them by middle of the month. One year they got them out in the first or second week and I had my taxes done before the first half of January was over.
No I mostly have to wait for my banks to send out 1099ints so I end up doing state and federal taxes in early February now.
For me, it depends if I'm getting a refund or not. If I'm getting a refund, usually by mid February after all my paperwork gets in. If I owe money, I'm waiting until April.
I do mine as soon as I have all my W-2s. It takes like 10 minutes. I don't know why there is a trope about them being hard or confusing. They're not, unless you're trying to itemize everything.
Yeah. I'm self employed and some of my income comes from a contract with a religious nonprofit. My wife has three jobs and one of them is for a nonprofit. We have complicatons from certain expenses too, even though we don't itemize we still end up with a number of extra forms to fill out.
We haven't been in a hurry this year. It's a pain and our kids are aging out of the tax credits. We usually feed and house four extra humans (three are ours) but only our 16 year old gives us a credit on last year's taxes. We're going to get a few hundred back but we just didn't have urgency to file. We're pretty much done, I think we'll submit it tomorrow.
If you only have W-2s it is easy. But there are lots of other things that can make it a mess. If you have a business, do stock trading, use crypto, or itemize (less common now), then it can take a fair bit of time.
The issue is you have to wait to get your tax docs in the mail. I got my W-2s (proof of wages/income from employment) sometime in mid-January, and I filed my state and federal taxes 3rd week of January.
However, my municipal taxes require me to receive a paper from them through the mail. I didn't get it until march. It had errors (as usual), and I've just been like, I'm not dealing with that. Last year it was also months late because I didn't want to deal with them.
I remember growing up my parents would procrastinate and then crunch to get them done on 4/15. It seemed like they did this every damn year.
Me? I usually do end of February or maybe the beginning of March. Takes a bit to get all my documentation, so no point in dealing with it much before that.
If you're wanting like my friend was, you'll keep asking for extensions and missing deadlines until you're assigned an auditor, at which point you'll finally submit paperwork covering your two tax documents, and then complain that the IRS is being unreasonable.
We did ours as soon as we had the documents, around mid Feb. Despite how incredibly awful everything is lately, there's still child tax credits and daycare credits from smarter times. No reason to procrastinate that, especially as we can invest it in a long term fund for the kids.
Before I had to wait on slow 1099s: as soon as the IRS and the software I used had the forms all set up.
Now: whenever the last slow-assed company sends me a 1099 which is sometime in March null
I want to do things ASAP and have them done, so that's hard. As an overseas citizen, I do get an automatic 6-month extension, but I've never had to come anywhere close to the normal deadline, even.
Honestly really surprised to find everyone here all do their taxes so quickly. I also did all of mine as early as I could (mid-Feb) but...
The only few American friends whom I'm close enough to talk about this, they all ignore it until the very last minute. So either late March/April, or not at all
For me, it depends on when all of our paperwork is in.
Generally, the W-2s from the employers don't come in until the end of January, then I have to wait on my stock account. My wife had unemployment last year, and dividends from an oil field.
All of that has to be in before we can file.
Technically we were ready mid-February but got laid out by hospitalizations. I think we filed mid-March?
@DeathByBigSad I usually try and do them early. Not Jan 1, it's near impossible to get your paperwork before mid-January, but usually it's late January/early February. I did wait until April this year, though
i set things up so I'm close to net zero, owe the state a tiny amount, tiny refund from the feis. There is no hurry, but I want them done late March just in case there is something weird I need to figure out (which has happened a couple times over the decades I've been eoing them.)
For my family, normally early March after all the paperwork has been received and I find time to sit and look at boring shit.
This year, I started around then and saw that we owed federal a bunch and I stopped as that fragile motivation was now gone and I wasn't in a hurry to send trumpy money for ballrooms, legal defense, bombs, ice, etc.
Finally went back to it last night and finished up tonight. I'm getting roughly the same amount back from my state.
I'm Canadian (so North American) and I do them first week of April now. When all I had was a minimum wage retail job it was easy enough to get my one or two forms and file really early, but now I have to wait for companies to get me the forms and some of them send them out as late as April 1st.
When I did them myself I would get them done by March at the latest. Now that I have a financial advisor that also does my taxes, I get the documents to them ASAP (assuming ADHD isn't getting in my way), and they tend to have them filed around the time I would've gotten them filed. Also nice to see that I didy taxes pretty accurately as how much I owed/was owed were effectively the se amount. Really wish the tax system was simplified for at least regular W2 employees where the taxes are basically all boilerplate with some numbers filled in.
Oofta, you have a job ahead of you then! As you'd have a lot of information to gather before actually getting the process started. I do my taxes via FreeTaxUSA, and they make the process pretty easy. As I can use an import code on my W2 to get it started. I make sure to have all the required documents before sitting down and committing to plugging in all the information (correctly, of course).
We get what you meant (w2), but in case it wasn't a typo, the w4 is what you submit when you start a job instructing the employer on how to modify what is taken out of your paychecks. They try to make them friendly for people by saying choose a number on certain lines pertaining to how many dependents you have because they expect you will get a larger return at the end of the year, so if you take more out up front you will still break even or still get some of your money back at the end of the year. If you know what you have/will have you can actually do all the math yourself up front and modify the amount taken out so the government isn't holding any of your money hostage throughout the year and you get it back in your paycheck, and end up having it at $0 owed at the end.
For most people they don't think it's worth it, but anyone who gets a $1800 or $3500 dollar tax return or such at the end of the year, is not doing their taxes very smart. As that's 3500 you could have invested or used for other things throughout the year.
I did mistype, as I meant W2. As for the other part of your post, I've set-up my W4 so that I pay the right amount in taxes...My tax return tends to be in the 300 dollar range. That is not very much money being held hostage by the government, Kansas State taxes are weird, but at least I don't own them much anymore these days. It used to be that I owed them money, but, I've dialed it in to make sure they own me a pittance that isn't even worth sending me to my bank account.
Can confirm. Agents just kicked my door in and shot me dead.
The only thing I really remember being taught was something like, "If you think you're going to cut it close, file for an extension."
It's just so damn easy now with the internet. I can get my W2 in my company portal, 1099's from the bank portal, and file my taxes (for a fee) in the browser.
We're not fiscally responsible enough to have anything going on that makes it very complicated, so there isn't much genuine fear to overcome my natural laziness and poor impulse control
51 Comments
finalarbiter@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 36 pts · 166d
I don't think it's possible to do taxes in January, most places don't have documents ready before the end of the month. I had to wait a few extra weeks for the documents from my investment account too, so not everything is always available on Jan 31.
I did mine in February this year. I'll probably wait and do it later next year, like mid-March, as I ended up missing a document that would have slightly increased my state return (not enough to go through the headache of fixing it).
Last year, I needed an extension, as it was first time doing it myself and my situation was fairly complex.
ThatGuy46475@lemmy.world · 11 pts · 166d
W2 is usually available by mid January, with the standard deduction being so high that’s all a lot of people need.
finalarbiter@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 6 pts · 166d
I don't think I've ever gotten my W2 before the end of January
evidences@lemmy.world · 6 pts · 166d
It depends a lot on the company, my company usually has them by middle of the month. One year they got them out in the first or second week and I had my taxes done before the first half of January was over.
No I mostly have to wait for my banks to send out 1099ints so I end up doing state and federal taxes in early February now.
finalarbiter@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 3 pts · 166d
That's great, I'd love to have my docs that early! I think I had to wait til nearly the end of February for some of my 1099s this year.
thermal_shock@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 165d
Got my W2, went to file, website wasn't ready lmao.
HobbitFoot@thelemmy.club · 11 pts · 166d
For me, it depends if I'm getting a refund or not. If I'm getting a refund, usually by mid February after all my paperwork gets in. If I owe money, I'm waiting until April.
Kolanaki@pawb.social · 9 pts · 166d
I do mine as soon as I have all my W-2s. It takes like 10 minutes. I don't know why there is a trope about them being hard or confusing. They're not, unless you're trying to itemize everything.
DeathByBigSad@sh.itjust.works · 14 pts · 166d
Its hard cuz my parents run small bussiness and you got all those weird additional forms... Not as simple as just scan and file.
Also theres a thing where you have to file separately with the city.
doingthestuff@lemy.lol · 4 pts · 166d
Yeah. I'm self employed and some of my income comes from a contract with a religious nonprofit. My wife has three jobs and one of them is for a nonprofit. We have complicatons from certain expenses too, even though we don't itemize we still end up with a number of extra forms to fill out.
We haven't been in a hurry this year. It's a pain and our kids are aging out of the tax credits. We usually feed and house four extra humans (three are ours) but only our 16 year old gives us a credit on last year's taxes. We're going to get a few hundred back but we just didn't have urgency to file. We're pretty much done, I think we'll submit it tomorrow.
EndlessNightmare@reddthat.com · 9 pts · 166d
If you only have W-2s it is easy. But there are lots of other things that can make it a mess. If you have a business, do stock trading, use crypto, or itemize (less common now), then it can take a fair bit of time.
Ziggurat@jlai.lu · 2 pts · 166d
So not more complicated than in most European nations?
Here I have a pre filled form, check the numbers and done.
village604@adultswim.fan · 7 pts · 165d
Right about now is when I start looking for the tax documents I need that are somewhere in the multiple stacks of unopened mail littering my office.
ADHD is fun.
disregardable@lemmy.zip · 6 pts · 166d
The issue is you have to wait to get your tax docs in the mail. I got my W-2s (proof of wages/income from employment) sometime in mid-January, and I filed my state and federal taxes 3rd week of January.
However, my municipal taxes require me to receive a paper from them through the mail. I didn't get it until march. It had errors (as usual), and I've just been like, I'm not dealing with that. Last year it was also months late because I didn't want to deal with them.
finalarbiter@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 3 pts · 166d
Some providers do digital distribution now. I didn't get any physical documents from my employer or investment account, just PDFs this year.
EndlessNightmare@reddthat.com · 6 pts · 166d
I remember growing up my parents would procrastinate and then crunch to get them done on 4/15. It seemed like they did this every damn year.
Me? I usually do end of February or maybe the beginning of March. Takes a bit to get all my documentation, so no point in dealing with it much before that.
fartographer@lemmy.world · 6 pts · 166d
If you're wanting like my friend was, you'll keep asking for extensions and missing deadlines until you're assigned an auditor, at which point you'll finally submit paperwork covering your two tax documents, and then complain that the IRS is being unreasonable.
Now, she just does things on time.
taiyang@lemmy.world · 5 pts · 166d
We did ours as soon as we had the documents, around mid Feb. Despite how incredibly awful everything is lately, there's still child tax credits and daycare credits from smarter times. No reason to procrastinate that, especially as we can invest it in a long term fund for the kids.
tiredofsametab@fedia.io · 4 pts · 166d
Before I had to wait on slow 1099s: as soon as the IRS and the software I used had the forms all set up.
Now: whenever the last slow-assed company sends me a 1099 which is sometime in March null
I want to do things ASAP and have them done, so that's hard. As an overseas citizen, I do get an automatic 6-month extension, but I've never had to come anywhere close to the normal deadline, even.
thermal_shock@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 165d
Mine are simple, I do them as soon as I get a W2. Partner does then midnight day before due.
zlatiah@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 166d
Honestly really surprised to find everyone here all do their taxes so quickly. I also did all of mine as early as I could (mid-Feb) but...
The only few American friends whom I'm close enough to talk about this, they all ignore it until the very last minute. So either late March/April, or not at all
Luminous5481@anarchist.nexus · 4 pts · 166d
DeathByBigSad@sh.itjust.works · 1 pts · 166d
Welp I'll have to do it for them like... right now... I'm eating breakfast rn and mom's keep nagging me to like hurry up and do the taxes...
I mean too bad, her house her rules... 🤷♂️ I dealing with depression and am a dependent so I have no choice but to do whatever they ask
jordanlund@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 166d
For me, it depends on when all of our paperwork is in.
Generally, the W-2s from the employers don't come in until the end of January, then I have to wait on my stock account. My wife had unemployment last year, and dividends from an oil field.
All of that has to be in before we can file.
Technically we were ready mid-February but got laid out by hospitalizations. I think we filed mid-March?
apfelwoiSchoppen@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 166d
You can't do them in January let alone New Year's Day as most tax forms have until the end of January to be sent to taxpayers.
AA5B@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 161d
The paperwork is supposed to be available by the end of January, so not usually before then.
So yeah, I stated a couple hours ago and spent most of that time fighting secure logins for online services I use once a year
czardestructo@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 164d
Did mine early March and I'm still waiting for the Feds to give me my money. Where's my money?!
klymilark@walsh.fallcounty.omg.lol · 3 pts · 166d
@DeathByBigSad I usually try and do them early. Not Jan 1, it's near impossible to get your paperwork before mid-January, but usually it's late January/early February. I did wait until April this year, though
bluGill@fedia.io · 3 pts · 166d
i set things up so I'm close to net zero, owe the state a tiny amount, tiny refund from the feis. There is no hurry, but I want them done late March just in case there is something weird I need to figure out (which has happened a couple times over the decades I've been eoing them.)
Witchfire@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 165d
I'm still fighting my old company for tax documents that are due in 4 days, and I don't even live in the US
Sharkticon@lemmy.zip · 2 pts · 165d
I'm doing mine today.
Marshezezz@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 2 pts · 164d
grumpo_potamus@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 166d
For my family, normally early March after all the paperwork has been received and I find time to sit and look at boring shit.
This year, I started around then and saw that we owed federal a bunch and I stopped as that fragile motivation was now gone and I wasn't in a hurry to send trumpy money for ballrooms, legal defense, bombs, ice, etc.
Finally went back to it last night and finished up tonight. I'm getting roughly the same amount back from my state.
IdontplaytheTrombone@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 165d
I usually do February or March.
vividspecter@aussie.zone · 2 pts · 166d
Better get going on those taxes Neddy!
IronKrill@lemmy.ca · 2 pts · 164d
I'm Canadian (so North American) and I do them first week of April now. When all I had was a minimum wage retail job it was easy enough to get my one or two forms and file really early, but now I have to wait for companies to get me the forms and some of them send them out as late as April 1st.
chickenf622@sh.itjust.works · 2 pts · 166d
When I did them myself I would get them done by March at the latest. Now that I have a financial advisor that also does my taxes, I get the documents to them ASAP (assuming ADHD isn't getting in my way), and they tend to have them filed around the time I would've gotten them filed. Also nice to see that I didy taxes pretty accurately as how much I owed/was owed were effectively the se amount. Really wish the tax system was simplified for at least regular W2 employees where the taxes are basically all boilerplate with some numbers filled in.
rem26_art@fedia.io · 2 pts · 166d
I did mine earlier this week. Normally I do them in March, but time kinda got away from me this year. My parents still haven't done theirs yet lol.
Chozo@fedia.io · 2 pts · 166d
Usually early February, as my employers generally wait until the latest allowed day (Jan 31) to actually process/mail my documents.
Nighed@feddit.uk · 1 pts · 166d
Is the US tax year just.... The year?
The UK tax year is the 6th-5th of April. I wonder how that happened....
(... Quarter days? And switching between the Julian and gregorian calendars apparently)
mnemonicmonkeys@sh.itjust.works · 5 pts · 166d
Yes, and the deadline for filing is April 15th
Soulphite@reddthat.com · 1 pts · 166d
Wait, we're supposed to do taxes??
turtlesareneat@piefed.ca · 4 pts · 166d
If you wait long enough the government just does it for you
EndlessNightmare@reddthat.com · 3 pts · 166d
Shitty life pro tip
LostWanderer@fedia.io · 1 pts · 166d
I try to do it as soon as I get my W2, I still haven't done my taxes...However, I will be doing that on Saturday!
DeathByBigSad@sh.itjust.works · 1 pts · 166d
I have to do parents taxes cuz they are tech illiterate (also horrible English) 🙃
LostWanderer@fedia.io · 2 pts · 166d
Oofta, you have a job ahead of you then! As you'd have a lot of information to gather before actually getting the process started. I do my taxes via FreeTaxUSA, and they make the process pretty easy. As I can use an import code on my W2 to get it started. I make sure to have all the required documents before sitting down and committing to plugging in all the information (correctly, of course).
LifeInMultipleChoice@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 1 pts · 166d
We get what you meant (w2), but in case it wasn't a typo, the w4 is what you submit when you start a job instructing the employer on how to modify what is taken out of your paychecks. They try to make them friendly for people by saying choose a number on certain lines pertaining to how many dependents you have because they expect you will get a larger return at the end of the year, so if you take more out up front you will still break even or still get some of your money back at the end of the year. If you know what you have/will have you can actually do all the math yourself up front and modify the amount taken out so the government isn't holding any of your money hostage throughout the year and you get it back in your paycheck, and end up having it at $0 owed at the end.
For most people they don't think it's worth it, but anyone who gets a $1800 or $3500 dollar tax return or such at the end of the year, is not doing their taxes very smart. As that's 3500 you could have invested or used for other things throughout the year.
LostWanderer@fedia.io · 2 pts · 166d
I did mistype, as I meant W2. As for the other part of your post, I've set-up my W4 so that I pay the right amount in taxes...My tax return tends to be in the 300 dollar range. That is not very much money being held hostage by the government, Kansas State taxes are weird, but at least I don't own them much anymore these days. It used to be that I owed them money, but, I've dialed it in to make sure they own me a pittance that isn't even worth sending me to my bank account.
HeHoXa@lemmy.zip · 1 pts · 164d
4/24 is the day for this chore
DeathByBigSad@sh.itjust.works · 1 pts · 164d
Doesn't armed IRS agents come to your house and shoot you?
That's the horror story we were all told growing up: "Never be late on your taxes or the taxman will bring the god of death!" -Mom
/joke
HeHoXa@lemmy.zip · 2 pts · 161d
If anyone has followed the saga, apparently 4/14 is my serious answer
HeHoXa@lemmy.zip · 1 pts · 164d
Can confirm. Agents just kicked my door in and shot me dead.
The only thing I really remember being taught was something like, "If you think you're going to cut it close, file for an extension."
It's just so damn easy now with the internet. I can get my W2 in my company portal, 1099's from the bank portal, and file my taxes (for a fee) in the browser.
We're not fiscally responsible enough to have anything going on that makes it very complicated, so there isn't much genuine fear to overcome my natural laziness and poor impulse control