Form 941-Employer's Quarterly Federal Tax Return

Form 941 is used to report your quarterly withholding tax liability and payments for federal income tax withholding, social security and Medicare withholding and the employer matching payments (payroll taxes) for social security and Medicare.  Be sure that the total taxes on line 10 agrees with the tax liability on Part 2, Line 15, if your quarterly taxes are more than $2,500. If you are a semi-weekly payer of withholding taxes, be sure that the total taxes on line 10 of Form 941 agrees with the Total Tax Liability on the bottom of 941 Schedule B.

Even though you may be a monthly, semi-weekly or quarterly payer of withholding taxes, employers file Form 941 once a quarter. Form 941 is filed quarterly on April 30 for the 1st quarter (Jan-March,) July 31 for the second quarter (April-June), October 31 for the third quarter (July - September) and January 31 for the fourth quarter (October-December).

You can download form 941 from the IRS website at: www.irs.gov. See also paying withholding and payroll taxes

The deadline for filing the return is the last day of the first month after a quarter ends. There is a penalty of 5% of the unpaid tax due for each month that the 941 return is not filed. The maximum penalty is 25% of the tax due. In addition to any penalties, interest accrues from the due date of the tax on any unpaid balance.

Please refer to the most current version of IRS Publication 15 for additional information on form 941

Payroll, payroll taxes and workers compensation are facts of life for businesses with employees.  While employees may be absolutely critical to the success of your business, they consume valuable resources that increase your cost of doing business. Make a mistake in calculating payroll withholding taxes and/or paying payroll taxes and you have angry employees and the IRS to deal with.

As you proceed with your business planning, you would be wise to consider purchasing a payroll software program to help process your payroll. Take a look at our payroll software program page to get an idea what types of features and reporting capabilities are important before you buy.