Warning: 941 filing process. Some important things you need to know.

Warning: 941 filing process. Some important things you need to know.

Jan 22, 2022


Surely you are an employer and you want to know how and when to complete the form 941 of your employees. Well, here are some tips about the filing process:


What is Form 941?

IRS Form 941 is the Employer's Quarterly Federal Tax Return. It's used by employers to report tax withholding amounts for estimated income tax payments, employer payments, and FICA taxes (more commonly known as Social Security and Medicare).

You must report the amounts on IRS Form 941 if you've been paying employees and you've been withholding federal taxes from their earnings.


Who Must File Form 941?

If you pay wages subject to federal income tax withholding or social security and Medicare taxes, you must file Form 941 quarterly to report the following amounts. Employees don't receive a copy. 

  • Wages you’ve paid.
  • Tips your employees reported to you.
  • Federal income tax you withheld.
  • Both the employer and the employee’s shares of social security and Medicare taxes.
  • Additional Medicare Tax withheld from employees.
  • Current quarter's adjustments to social security and Medicare taxes for fractions of cents, sick pay, tips, and group-term life insurance.
  • Deferred amount of the employer share of social security tax.
  • Qualified small business payroll tax credit for increasing research activities.
  • Credit for qualified sick and family leave wages.
  • Employee retention credit.

Form 941 is additionally used to:

  • Adjust amounts due
  • Calculate a total payroll tax liability
  • Subtract amounts already paid to get a final amount of overpayment or underpayment

When To File Form 941?

IRS Form 941 is due at the end of each quarter. You have 10 more days after the due date to file Form 941 for the quarter, if you've made your payroll tax deposits for the quarter completely and on time these are the filing dates:

Quarter 1 (January, February March) - You must submit by May 10 for the quarter ending March 31.

Quarter 2 (April, May, June) - You must submit by August 10 for the quarter ending June 30.

Quarter 3 (July, August, September) - You must submit by November 10 for the quarter ending September 30.

Quarter 4 (October, November, December) - You must submit by February 10 for the quarter ending December 31


Where Should You File?

Form 941 is available online at the IRS website. You can download a blank copy, or you can complete it online then save it to your hard drive and print out the finished copy.


For electronic form: Go to IRS.gov/EmploymentEfile for more information on electronic filing. 

For a hard copy: Go to IRS.gov/PDS  it shows the current list of PDSs. Used the following link for IRS mailing address IRS.gov/ PDSstreetAddresses. 


Do not miss the following steps on your filing:

  • Check the Box for the Quarter: Under “Report for this Quarter of 2020” at the top of Form 941, check the appropriate box of the quarter for which you’re filing
  • Complete all three pages. You must complete all three pages of Form 941 and sign on page 3. Failure to do so may delay processing of your return.

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SOURCES: https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/i941.pdf

https://www.thebalancesmb.com/how-and-when-to-file-form-941-for-payroll-taxes-398365