There is one group of people who still need to pay attention to the April 15 date for taxes, even after all of the law changes connected with COVID-19 response.
"Even though the tax return and the balance due money has been extended, those people who are needing to make quarterly estimated tax payments, those dates have not been extended the same way," said Jo Wiebe with H&R Block® in Hutchinson. "For the federal estimated payment that's normally due April 15, that one has been extended to July 15, but the June payment was not. However, the state of Kansas has not extended the April 15 estimated tax payment due date. Anyone that has quarterly estimates that they normally need to pay, it would be highly advisable for them to continue to get their tax return completed so that they would know how much estimated payment they need to make by April 15 and not be late, especially on that Kansas one."
This is generally self-employed people or those with a lot of investment income that doesn't have withholding. Many people are also asking about how they will get the stimulus money from the CARES act legislation.
"If you have filed your tax return for 2019, the IRS is going to be issuing those payments through the method that you used to receive your refund on the 2019 tax return," Wiebe said. "If you have not filed a 2019 tax return, they will go back and look at your 2018 tax return to see how you filed at that time and which way you wanted your money to come back."
Other people who get money from the government but don't file returns will also get payments, like Social Security and railroad retirement recipients.
"They are not to worry," Wiebe said. "The government knows the bank account that their Social Security or railroad retirement money is deposited into. They will be using that means to get the stimulus payments to those people."
The only people who will need to let the government know their bank information are those who don't have a direct deposit account on file with the federal government. There will be a secure place to give the government that information that should be launched in the next few days.