You might not like paying taxes, but when you pay taxes via credit card can be quite rewarding. The key is to earn credit card rewards that more than offset tax payment fees. For example, if you’ve signed up recently for a card that requires large spend to get a big welcome bonus, paying taxes via credit card can be the solution.
Here’s everything you need to know about paying taxes with credit cards…
Table of Contents
Important due dates
2021 Tax Year Due Dates
- April 18 2022: End of year taxes due. Taxpayers in Maine or Massachusetts have until April 19, 2022, to file their returns due to the Patriots’ Day holiday in those states.
2022 Tax Year Due Dates
- April 18, 2022: 1st quarter 2022 estimated taxes due.
(Payable online from 03/01/22 – 05/15/22) - June 15, 2022: 2nd quarter 2022 estimated taxes due.
(Payable online from 05/15/22 – 07/15/22) - September 15, 2022: 3rd quarter 2022 estimated taxes due.
(Payable online from 07/15/22 – 10/15/22) - January 16, 2023: 4th quarter 2022 estimated taxes due.
(Payable online from 10/15/22 – ?) - April 17, 2023: End of year taxes due.
Deals
Current Deals
- Nearside Debit: 2.2% back on debit spend through 2023. Note that the 2.2% just launched this year. So, while taxes aren’t excluded in cashback, there’s been no DP’s yet.
- Peruse best credit card welcome offers here.
- Simon Mall has been offering near-weekly discounts on fees for bulk orders of $1K gift cards. You can see the current (or most recent) deal here.
Future Deals
- Discover It will offer 5% back on PayPal (and restaurants) on up to $1,500 spend, July – September 2022. Both ACI Payments and PayUSATax allow payments via PayPal.
Pay taxes via credit card: Key Info
Here is key information you’ll need to know about paying taxes with credit or debit cards:
Credit card fee 1.87% to 1.98%
The IRS maintains a list of companies that accept credit and debit cards towards tax payments. You can find the current information by clicking here. Currently there are three separate payment processing companies on the list. At the time of this writing, debit card fees range from $2.20 to $2.55 per transaction and credit card fees range from 1.87% to 1.98%. Alternatively, you can pay taxes via the Plastiq Bill Pay service, but that will cost you more: 2.85%.
Additional Info Direct from the IRS
The IRS page that lists options for paying by credit or debit card also lists the following “Additional Information”:
- No part of the card service fee goes to IRS.
- You don’t need to send in a voucher if you pay by card.
- Card processing fees are tax deductible for business taxes.
- You must contact the card processor to cancel a card payment.
- IRS will refund any overpayment unless you owe a debt on your account.
[Editor’s caution: In recent years the IRS has been very slow to do so] - Your card statement will list your payment as “United States Treasury Tax Payment” and your fee as “Tax Payment Convenience Fee” or something similar.
- Federal tax lien releases can take up to 30 days after we receive full payment; liens may remain for other individuals who haven’t fully paid their portion.
- When you pay while filing your taxes through online software, different card fees apply.
Two payment limit per processor
The IRS maintains a table of frequency limits for paying taxes via credit or debit card (found here). In general, they say you can make up to two payments per tax period per type of tax payment. For example, you can make 2 payments every quarter to your quarterly estimated taxes, and you can make 2 payments every year to your annual taxes. Important: In my experience, these limits are enforced per payment processing company. That means that you can really make up to 6 payments per tax period per type of tax payment (or more if you make Plastiq bill payments as well). An IRS advisor I spoke with several years ago did not think that there would be any problem with making more than 2 payments by using different processors. Since then, I have made more than 2 payments per tax period many times and never had any issues. That is, of course, just my own personal experience. I can’t guarantee that your outcome would be the same.
Twice as many potential payments when filing jointly
If you file jointly with a partner, you can make payments in each person’s name, separately. These payments will still apply to the one overall tax return, but not always automatically. According to reader reports, in some cases the IRS matches these payments to the combined return automatically. In other cases, people have reported the need to call the IRS to ask them to combine the payments. I recommend calling shortly after filing your annual taxes to ensure that the IRS has correctly applied both sets of payments to the same return.
Obviously if you are filing separately, you can each make your own payments without any issues.
No cash advance fees
I’m often asked whether credit card companies charge cash advance fees when paying taxes by credit card. The answer is no. All three official IRS payment processors agree (via their FAQ pages) that the payment is treated as a purchase not a cash advance. You can find FAQ info here, here, and here.
Unlimited payments via Plastiq
If you’re willing to incur higher fees, you can make an unlimited number of tax payments via the Plastiq bill pay service. Plastiq usually charges 2.85% to pay bills (including taxes) via credit card, but they occasionally offer lower fees via short term promotions. For details, please see: Plastiq Bill Payment Service.
To pay taxes via Plastiq, use Plastiq’s tax payment screen: plastiq.com/us-taxes.
Are tax payment fees deductible?
Fees are no longer deductible for personal taxes: Tax preparation fees used to be deductible when itemizing deductions for personal tax returns, but that is no longer the case.
Card processing fees are tax deductible for business taxes: This can substantially reduce your net cost of using payment services.
Tax payment history (how to see your info online)
Once you’ve made payments through online processors, Plastiq, or other means, you may want to see proof that the IRS received the amount you sent. You can view past payments by signing up here: irs.gov/payments/view-your-tax-account.
Reporting estimated payments
Estimated payments should be reported when filing your annual taxes. In my experience, if you make a mistake and forget to report some of these payments, the IRS will eventually catch the error and refund the difference.
How to pay end of year taxes
Tell your tax preparer or tax software that you’ll pay via check. Then, browse to the appropriate tax payment site (e.g. Pay1040.com, OfficialPayments.com, PayUSAtax.com, or Plastiq.com/us-taxes) to pay your taxes. There is no need to mail in the 1040V payment voucher.
What happens if you over-pay your taxes?
Overpayments will be refunded: The IRS will refund any overpayment unless you owe a debt on your account. Update/Caution: In recent years the IRS has been very slow to refund overpayments.
How to request a refund if it doesn’t come automatically
Schedule an appointment with the Taxpayer Assistance Center by calling 844-545-5640. When you finally speak to an agent, explain that you overpaid and would like a refund rather than applying the extra to next year’s taxes. Hat Tip: Rapid Travel Chai via personal communication.
Do you need to mail in payment vouchers?
No. No payment voucher is required. You don’t need to send in a voucher if you pay by card.
Pay with Paypal
Both ACI Payments and PayUSATax allow payments via PayPal. Sometimes cards like the Discover It, Discover It Student, and Chase Freedom offer 5% rewards for Paypal purchases (up to $1500 combined spend per quarter). Tax payments during these times should count!
NOTE: There is a weird issue with selecting to pay with PayPal on the PayUSATax website. When clicking the PayPal button, a screen flashes up and disappears. Here is a work-around that has worked for some people, but not all: Put in valid credit card information first (for any credit card) and then press the PayPal button. When doing it this way, I got the PayPal screen to successfully load.
Pay with Samsung Pay & Google Pay
Some tax payment websites support mobile wallet payments such as Samsung Pay or Google Pay. The US Bank Altitude Reserve card earns 3X for mobile wallet payments, so it should be a great match. However, readers have reported that Samsung Pay and Google Pay are only supported through Visa Checkout and that this does not trigger the Altitude’s 3X rewards.
Top 5 reasons to pay federal taxes with a credit card or gift card
1. Profit w/ a 3% Cash Back card
A number of credit cards earn cash rewards greater than 2%. Some even earn 3% cash back:
- The new/updated Paypal Mastercard will earn 3% cash back on all PayPal purchases. Details here. This approach will work only with the services that allow payment through PayPal.
- The Paceline card earns 3% cash back for all spend on weeks in which you meet the app’s exercise goals.
- The Discover It Miles card earns 3% for the first year of card membership (you earn 1.5% and then at the end of the year all cash back earned is doubled).
Since you’ll earn 3% cash back on both the base tax payment and the processing fees with the above cards, your profit will be slightly more than 1% of your tax payment.
Example:
- $10,000 tax payment + 1.96% fee = $10,196
- Cash back earned at 3% = $305.88
- Profit = $305.88 – $196 = $109.88 (1.1% of $10K)
For more examples of cards that earn better than 2% rewards, see: Best Rewards for Everyday Spend.
2. Meet minimum spend requirements
If you recently signed up for new credit cards, chances are good that you have to spend thousands of dollars in order to earn the associated signup bonuses. Paying taxes is a cheap and easy way to accomplish that.
Below are some of the most valuable current welcome bonuses for consumer cards. If you’re interested in business cards, please click here to see the best business card offers.
Click on a card for details; Press “Next” to see more offers:
Card Offer
![](http://cdn.nextinsure.com/imaging/opt/73e79a4a-2cdd-4bf0-abd8-fd194139ebae.png?w=300" alt="Capital One Venture X Rewards Credit Card" />){kind=small}
![](http://cdn.nextinsure.com/imaging/opt/534df778-fadf-4350-9e01-291110eaf2a9.png?w=300" alt="Capital One SavorOne Cash Rewards Credit Card" />){kind=small}
3. Buy points cheaply
Several credit cards offer up to 1.5 transferable points or miles per dollar. In these cases, a 2% tax payment fee (rounding up a little) means that you can essentially buy miles for 1.3 cents each. Even better, some cards earn 2 transferable points per dollar for all qualifying purchases. With these 2X everywhere cards you can essentially buy points/miles for 1 cent each. Either way, if you plan to use your points toward high value awards, this is a cheap way to acquire those points.
2X Example:
- $10,000 tax payment + 2% fee = $10,200
- Miles earned at 2X = 20,400
- Cost per mile = $200 / 20,400 = 0.98 cents per mile (round up to 1 cent per mile)
1.5X Example:
- $10,000 tax payment + 2% fee = $10,200
- Miles earned at 1.5X = 15,300
- Cost per mile = $200 / 15,300 = 1.3 cents per mile
Cards that offer 2X transferable points per dollar:
Note that some cards offering 2x everywhere are not included below because their points are worth much less than airline miles. An example is that most Marriott cards offer 2x everywhere rewards.
- Citi Double Cash: Earns 2 cents per dollar, uncapped. Cash rewards can be converted to ThankYou points, and when paired with a Citi Premier or Prestige card, those points can be transferred to a selection of airline and hotel programs.
Card Offer and Details - Amex Blue Business Plus: Earns 2 Membership Rewards points per dollar on up to $50K spend per calendar year. Points can be transferred to a large selection of airline programs or to a few hotel programs.
Card Offer and Details - Capital One Venture, Venture X, or Spark Miles. Capital One offers three cards that earn 2X “Miles” per dollar on all qualifying spend. These “miles” can be transferred to airline miles & hotel points, usually at a 1 to 1 rate. This means that the following cards are capable of earning 2X miles everywhere:
Card Offer and Details
Cards that offer 1.5X points or airline miles per dollar:
- Chase Ultimate Rewards. Two no-fee cards in Chase’s lineup earn 1.5 Ultimate Rewards points per dollar for all spend. Pair either one with a premium card (e.g. Sapphire Reserve, Sapphire Preferred, Ink Business Preferred) to transfer points to several airline or hotel programs:
Card Offer and Details - Amex Membership Rewards. Amex offers two cards that are capable of earning up to 1.5X. In either case, points can be transferred to a large selection of airline programs or to a few hotel programs. Note that the Everyday Preferred card requires 30 charges per billing cycle to earn 1.5x, and the Business Platinum card requires purchases of $5K or more to earn 1.5x when paying taxes.
Card Offer and Details - Airline miles. A few airline branded cards offer 1.5 miles per dollar for all spend:
Card Offer and Details
4. Earn valuable big spend bonuses: elite status, free nights, companion pass, etc.
Many credit cards offer bonuses for meeting high spend thresholds. You can find a comprehensive list here: Best big spend bonuses. Here are a few examples:
- Amex Delta Reserve or Delta Reserve Business: Spend $30,000, get 15,000 Medallion Qualifying Miles (towards elite status). At $60,000, $90,000, and $120,000 you’ll get another 15,000 Medallion Qualifying Miles.
- Amex Delta Platinum or Delta Platinum Business: Spend $25,000, get 10,000 Medallion Qualifying Miles (towards elite status). At $50,000 spend, get another 10,000 Medallion Qualifying Miles.
- Southwest Plus, Southwest Premier, or Southwest Business: With Southwest, when you earn 125,000 points in a calendar year (including points earned from credit card spend) you get a companion pass good for an unlimited number of flights for the rest of that year and all of the next calendar year.
- Barclaycard JetBlue Plus, or JetBlue Business: Spend $50,000 and get Mosaic status which offers free changes and cancellations; free checked bags; expedited security; early boarding; free drinks; enhanced point earnings; and 15,000 bonus points upon qualifying.
5. Liquidate Visa/MasterCard gift cards cheaply
Visa and MasterCard gift cards are debit cards. As such, they qualify for low flat fees for debit tax payments: $2.20, $2.50, or $2.55 (depending upon the tax processor you use). In other words, your cost to liquidate $500 gift cards will be approximately half a percent. That’s pretty cheap.
If you use $500 Visa/MasterCard gift cards, then you can pay the following amounts:
- PayUSAtax.com ($2.55 fee): Make a $497.45 payment with a $500 gift card.
- What is known to work:
- What sometimes works:
- Vanilla brand Mastercard gift cards sometimes work with PayUSAtax and sometimes do not. The ability to pay with these Mastercard gift cards through PayUSAtax seems to come and go.
- What is known to not work:
- Vanilla brand Visa gift cards are not recognized as debit cards at PayUSAtax.com and so they will incur the higher credit card processing fee.
- Metabank issued Mastercard gift cards are reportedly not working at PayUSAtax (Reported again on 5/26/21 by Dokus).
- Pay1040.com ($2.50 fee): Make a $497.50 payment with a $500 gift card.
- What is known to work:
- Metabank issued Visa gift cards (including from Simon Mall) appear to be working again. Reported by Rosco in October 2021. But Vince reports otherwise in November 2021. YMMV.
- Metabank issued Mastercard gift cards are working as debit cards. Reported by StepheH. Reported again on 5/26/21 by Dokus.
- Sunrise Visa working as debit at Pay1040.
- Vanilla brand Mastercard gift cards work at Pay1040. Reported by Yue.
- What is known to work:
- ACI Payments (Previously named “Official Payments”) ($2.20 fee): Make a $497.80 payment with a $500 gift card.
- What is known to work:
- Metabank issued Visa gift cards (including from Simon Mall) appear to be working (note though that this seems to come and go over time). Vince reported problems with Simon gift cards in November 2021. YMMV.
- Vanilla brand Visa gift cards work at ACI
- What is known to work:
The biggest problem with this (besides the fact that what works and what doesn’t work keeps changing!) is the IRS imposed 2 payments per processor limit. This means that you can liquidate no more than 6 gift cards per type of tax payment. In the past, Official Payments allowed more payments via phone. Recent reports, though, indicate that this is no longer the case.
See also: Best options for buying Visa and MasterCard gift cards.
Hey Greg – any recent DPs of tax payments not qualifying for Amex MSR? Was just told by a rep I had only met 50% of spend on a (now expired) MSR period for Biz Plat in which half of the MSR was done via paying taxes according to this guide. I’m worried I’m SOL on 150k MRs.
I received partial welcome bonus on Marriott Bonvoy Brilliant card (50K points instead of 150k points, I did receive the free night cert) and Amex rep opened a case. The back office response was that spend threshold has not been met due to tax payment transaction not eligible.
I argued that the T&C only states that the purchase of cash equivalents is not eligible. Tax payments are neither a purchase of cash equivalents nor listed in the prohibited list. The 2nd rep noted this down as a dispute to the back office response to the case. It took 5 calls over 2 months before I did receive the balance 100k points.
In my case I also questioned the case response as dubious because if requirements are not met then why was partial welcome bonus awarded. I have same problem unresolved with the Marriott business card (partial points and only 1 of 2 FNC), and have not been able to call repeatedly to pursue it since each call takes an hour or so.
No other datapoints that I’ve heard.
I was just told by Amex that tax payments do not count toward points/bonus spend
Thanks Tim. I’m pretty confident that reps who say that are misinformed. I haven’t paid taxes recently with Amex so I can’t prove it myself, but I bet many others have. Can anyone here chime in with a recent datapoint showing that Amex cards earn points & welcome bonuses when paying taxes?
I accidentally overpaid my taxes via CC, but didn’t get a confirmation number or email. Did my payment get through? How long does it take to post to CC? It’s been 2 days and no confirmation email or pending transaction on my CC.
It sounds like the payment didn’t go through. You should at least have a pending charge right away.
DP: Paid estimated taxes with Nearside debit card using PayUSATax. Was charged flat $2.55 debit fee. Received 2.2% cashback from Nearside on both the tax payment and the debit fee.
Good to hear!
Can also confirm receiving 2.2% back on PayUSAtax with Nearside.
I searched, but didn’t see anything here about the Amex Rewards Debit Card. Unfortunately, my Datapoint is that it seems like ACI would accept it, but as a credit card with the 1.98% fees, and PAYUSA tax thinks it is an invalid card number. I already used my two payments on pay1040 with a credit card, so I didn’t try there. Disappointing, because that would be a great use of the Amex Rewards Debit.
Thanks for that info. Disappointing but not unexpected
When filing a joint return and making 3+ payments, do you need to switch the Primary tax payer to get more than 2 payments or does it not matter?
You can do more with a single tax ID by switching payment processors.
Hi, Greg. I just used a Vanilla brand debit Visa to pay estimated taxes at PayUSAtax.com. So it’s accepting that brand again, at least for the moment.
Glad to hear it!
So let me get this straight…I can connect my Citi Premier MC to my Paypal account, pay my taxes with Paypal and get 3% back, and then apply the dollars toward my minimum spend on the Citi card when I pay off the Paypal stmt?
Am I missing something here?
Not exactly. 3 percent back is by paying with the new PayPal MasterCard through PayPal
You need to stop advertising Nearside as “unlimited 2.2%” cash-back. They are not.
Learned hard way they are offering “2.2% cash back at participating merchants”
Don’t even dream on cash back on tax payment or regular online payments with the card. But you could have 2.2% at PANDA EXPRESS
DP above disagrees with you.
Maybe he need to try it before “disagreeing”
I actually made a payment and iT WASNT counted toward cash back. I called CS and got and explanation about “selected merchants”. Telling you, near side is a dud.
Hey Arch, you made a similar comment on another thread and I never head back from you regarding DP.
I think what Rob was trying to point out is that a commenter above paid taxes with Nearside and got cash back on the entire amount.
Which merchants did you not receive cash back on? I haven’t yet run across that with any of my purchases (including utilities) and haven’t heard any reports of cash back being denied, so would love to get more specific DP’s from you.
Hi Tim,
My bank is accepting debit card as method of payment. I tried Nearside and they did not count this as transaction eligible for cash back. I called CS and got the story about “participating merchants listed on web site”. Btw here is disclaimer from Nearside website:
Thank you,
A
Would paying $500 via Custom Cash followed by paying the remainder via Citi Double Cash be the best option? Would it code as 5% for Custom Cash?
No, 5% only applies to covered categories. Plus you’d pay 1.87%.
The smart move is to buy a $500 prepaid Visa/MC gift card at a pharmacy, which will get you 5% back, then pay with the prepaid card which will qualify as a debit card when paying taxes.
Key question about paying Federal taxes with Plastiq: How long does it take for the payment to go through?
This should probably be addressed above and on the dedicated Plastiq page, which, at present, only says (generally) that “payments by check usually take about a week, but two weeks is not unusual.” I don’t know if that applies to Fed. tax payments, but if it does that obviously won’t work when close to the due date.
@Kent, set up your login with IRS.gov through ID.me and you can see the details for your account, including date posted.
If I use Pay1040 to pay my jointly filed annual federal taxes, can I split the payment across 2 different credit cards, to meet two points promos I am chasing? Is it okay to make both payments in my name, since I am the primary tax filer?
Yes that’s fine. Just make two separate payments of however much you want to charge to each card
If I generally get a refund, can I still pay estimated quarterly taxes and just get refunded the difference. Need to meet minimum spend on my new Platinum Card
Yes
Do I have to pay in all four quarters?
No
@David, that’s very creative. High-five.
Should I be worried that no estimated payments made a year ago for tax year 2021 are showing on the IRS website? Payments are showing for every year before tax year 2021. This is for the primary SSN.
Surprisingly, P2 sees their estimated payments on their logon (but not any of the payments made by P1; those aren’t showing anywhere).
What happens when paying an amount that contains pennies, e.g. $500.12?
I thought the IRS only deals in whole dollars. Or do they add all estimated payments and round, i.e. 499.50 would turn into $500?
I don’t think there’s a problem unless you use TurboTax due to a known rounding problem. Outside of Turbotax, I believe that the IRS allows you to round to the nearest dollar but you don’t have to do so. Below is what I posted previously on here about what happened to me last year using TurboTax:
“Some of you may benefit from knowing how I got into this mess: TurboTax rounded my payments to the nearest dollar, which meant that it under-reported my payments by $1. (I made numerous payments via credit card). They sent me a letter to which I responded, but they still held my $8,000+ refund for 8 months. Ridiculous. So, if you use TurboTax (which I certainly don’t recommend), I suggest either ensuring your payments are in whole dollars and/or carefully checking to be sure that TurboTax doesn’t do any rounding.”
Pay1040 is good and is the cheapest, but the problem is they do not have all of the possible forms and there is no way that you can fill in the information that is not listed. When I called them about a form that was not listed they suggested I use one of the other providers but those are more expensive so my return was less. Not good.
When I filed my tax I chose credit card for payment (which h&r block direct me to pay1040 with higher rate), I then opened another tab and proceed the payment. And I just noticed this site suggested to select pay by check instead.
Should be be worry about what I did?
According to the IRS, the tax due date is 18 April 2022, not 15 April (likely due to the Good Friday on the 15th).
Thanks! Fixed.
Any thoughts on NYS taxes, which charges 2.25%?
What kind of thoughts are you looking for?
I was wondering if Nick came up with a clever idea for NYS taxes? 🙂
was approved of chase ink case but only 3k credit limit. I know my taxes are more than 3k, can I use card multiple times but pay off balance and use it again? idk if that will prompt them to close my account.
It’s called cycling credit. In general, banks don’t like it, but if you do it once it should be ok. I had to do it twice to do the $7500 MSR on Ink Cash/Unlimited with a $3k limits.
You can cycle credit as long as you pay it off. I do it all the time. Never had an issue.
Do the tax payment and the fees show up as two different charges on the credit card? or combined into one charge?
Two different charges with pay1040.
I believe they all show up as separate charges
One thing to note for those who pay taxes for someone else. This is normally no problem and was not in 2021. This year (via PayUSAtax only) there is an issue when the taxpayer’s zip code is different from the payer’s debit card zip code. It just does not accept that – at least for a debit card payment. Tried many times, complained to PayUSATax, but it seems they didn’t do anything to fix it, at least as far as last month anyway. No problem with the other 2 payers.
I will try again for Q2 2022 and see. Will update if anything changes. Very annoying.
I had the same problem today for myself – the taxpayer zip and the debit card zip were the same. PayUSATax kept telling me the Zip Code didn’t match when it was entered correctly. Other two processors worked fine. This is with Simon Mall/Metabank debit cards.
If you use the schedule payment option it works for one payment at a time and charges the card the following morning at 5am. This bypasses the zip code problem as a temporary fix.
I am hoping someone can shed me some light here and i know it sounds a stupid quesiton but i couldn’t find the answer. I see lots of writing about how to make payment via credit card and i got that part. However, I don’t see any writing on how to submit the income tax to IRS after make the payment. Normally I used Turbo tax on my PC do the filing and paid online via Turbo tax. So when I pay via pay1040.com, I don’t see an option allow me to submit my tax return file to the IRS? I am very much appreciated for any help.
Never mind. Found it.
where is that option? I didnt get anything to submit while I was going through pay1040
Just ran into your blog. I have a 100k tax burden for this year. Unfortunately, I don’t think I’ll have enough time to sign up for a card. I currently have the CSP and Chase Ink Business Unlimited, as well as Chase freedom. Are any of these worth using to pay off my taxes?
Probably not, but if you had a need for lots of Ultimate Rewards points it wouldn’t be terrible to use the Ink Business Unlimited to get 1.5 points per dollar
Wouldn’t be terrible at all if you want to transfer them to Hyatt. For those of us in the Hyatt ecosystem, it’s not hard at all to get a meaningful $0.02 per Hyatt point, so while manufacturing 150,000 Hyatt points at a cost of $1,960 is not something I would probably choose to do, if I had to spend $100,000, the opportunity to get 150,000 Hyatt points for an extra 2% is not a bad one.
I’m writing this after just returning from a wonderful stay in a super-large suite at a very elegant property, at 18,000 points. Would I have paid $1,000 for the suite? No. How about the $500 that corresponds to the absolute low off-peak price that occasionally is possible. Nope. But for $235, i.e., the 1.96% fee a tax payment on $12,000 that yields 18,000 points … all day and all night!
You could get Amex Business Platinum and get the number instantly. You’ll earn 1.5MR per $ for payments over $5k. SUB is 150k I believe. The only issue is your limit probably won’t be $100k so you need multiple cards to max out this spend.
Don’t forget 3% cash back anywhere with the Paceline card. This card is amazing!, as long as you get 150 minutes of exercise a week, which you should be doing anyways, and it counts walking!
Can I still make 2021 federal taxes payment on Plastiq before I file my 2021 return next month? Any DP if the payment posts?
Good news and bad news. My accountant just called me and told me I’m getting a huge refund for 2021 on taxes – I had planned to use a credit card to pay so I’d get points. However, I do have to do quarterly New Jersey 2022 tax payments.
Can I use pay1040 or payusatax for state quarterly payments?
Thx
A refund is never good news. You just gave the government an interest- free loan for a year and could’ve been investing that money.
I know. I blame my accountant for telling me to make qtrly payments when I didn’t need to.
Art, it’s not all bad news. See David’s post above, and Esquiar’s just below…make the payments anyway, get the points, and IRS will refund the overpayment. I think that would work for you. Only downside is waiting for IRS to process the refund. If that opportunity cost is OK with you, then you’re fine.
How are people doing with refunds? I filed early March, still waiting for $4k refund…
Update: got refund a month after filing, only a week later than IRS 3 week target. I made one large overpayment to max out a promo in December
What you don’t discuss is merging points to create a greater value. For example, while the Chase Freedom earns 1.5% back, if you have the Reserve card, then depending on how you redeem the points, it could have a 50% bonus.
Any idea if you pay with EIN can you do 6 payments in addition to SSN?
TIN?
Actually, it’s a due date of 4/18/22 or 4/19 this quarter.
From the IRS website:
“April 18 tax filing deadline for most
The filing deadline to submit 2021 tax returns or an extension to file and pay tax owed is Monday, April 18, 2022, for most taxpayers. By law, Washington, D.C., holidays impact tax deadlines for everyone in the same way federal holidays do. The due date is April 18, instead of April 15, because of the Emancipation Day holiday in the District of Columbia for everyone except taxpayers who live in Maine or Massachusetts. Taxpayers in Maine or Massachusetts have until April 19, 2022, to file their returns due to the Patriots’ Day holiday in those states. “
Today I successfully made payments using vanilla VGC on pay1040 and aci payments (federal), and ACI payments / officialpayments.com (CA state). However I am not getting payusatax to work for vanilla brand VGC, even if I use it as a credit card option rather than debit card option. It is telling me the billing zip code does not match. Anyone else having this problem as well?
I have the exact same problem with Simon Metabank VGCs on payusatax as well (see 3 entries earlier). Just ordered another batch to see if problem fixed. If not, will have 1 less vendor to burn cards.
Did you try the other VGC such as that issued by Sutton Bank? I was wondering if it’s the Metabank or it’s the VGC in general.
No, I haven’t tried VGCs from other banks. I use Simon Metabank VGC exclusively because of the $1k value.
I just tried cards from a new batch, still doesn’t work.
I was able to make several CA state payments on ACI payments on Mar 25th using Vanilla VGC, but I bought some new Vanilla VGCs later, and wasn’t able to use those to make additional state payments. I get a generic error of “The system encountered an error while trying to process your request.” Anyone else experience any issues with ACI Payments recently?
Today, Simon Gift Cards coming up with this zip code error on the PayUSATax site. The cards are working on the other sites.
It is probably the same issue I posted about today. Zip code mismatch on payment card address vs taxpayer’s zip code. Try and see if you can add an address to your vanilla card and use the same zip as taxpayer.
In my case my debit cards have my real address on them so it doesn’t work. Had this issue since early 2022. It seems to be an issue with PayUSAtax, unless they just don’t like Vanilla cards which I don’t use.
OK, made my payments looking for 125K MRs. Hope the IRS does their job and processes in a timely manner. HAHAHA
what is the correct form to use? current tax year 2021 or estimated tax 2021?
Just tried 8 different Simon Metabank GCs on PayUSATax, 4 of mine, 4 of my wife’s, all declined, stating zip code didn’t match card on file. However I used those same cards on Pay1040 and ACIPay and all went through fine. This is as of Jan 14 2022. What’s up with PayUSATax?
Bump, anyone else have luck using Simon’s Metabank VGC on PayUSATax? Mine are still not working. Probably going to get another batch and try some new cards.
Just successfully made 2 payments on PayUSATax using $1000 Simon VGC (I don’t know if they’re Metabank) this evening.
See my earlier posts.
[…] Paying Taxes With Your Credit Card: It’s everyone’s favorite time of year again…. Yes it’s officially tax season. If you have to pay your taxes, you might as well earn some points while doing so. Here’s a great guide for you to follow. […]
A Simon/Metabank GC worked for me today at PayUSATax as debit for $2.55 fee.
I had the opposite experience with PayUSATax today; two Simon mall Metabank issued Visa GCs (card #s beginning with 4088) did not work. The website returned a message indicating the card is not a debit card. But, a Metabank issued VGC (card # beginning with 4358) purchased at a supermarket processed as debit.
I currently have zero debt with the IRS, but will have a large bill due when I file my 2021 taxes. If I process payments prior to the Q4 estimated tax deadline (Jan 18), can that payment be applied towards my 2021 taxes (due in April 2022)?
yes, a payment made now will apply to your 2021 taxes and should be reported on your 2021 return
Just my experience with the online federal tax payment services.
1st quarter 2021 I made 6 payments (2 each thru the services) since I had an Amex offer to spend $500 get $50 back 10 times. When it came time to make the 2nd quarter payments, none of the services would let me pay. Just to double check I did it again in the 3rd qtr at one site and it was still a no-go. Finally, end of December I decided to try again and it went through.
So, in my case, by using all 3 services twice, it’s possible that the system basically credited my 2 per quarter payments for the first 3 quarters in the first quarter. I don’t know if this was WAI or not.
Dumb question, I need to make $5K in payments to CA, and the service charge is 2.3%. I would be paying with Freedom Unlimited 1.5X spend. I am not working towards any bonuses, etc. My principal goal is to redeem UR for Southwest flights, since I need to visit family very frequently.
Does it still make sense pay the 2.3% service charge? Thanks,
Hi fellow, Ian!
It would only be worth it if your Southwest flights offer a really good redemption value. At a 1.3¢ per point average redemption value, 1.5 pt/$* 1.3¢/pt == 1.95¢/$. You would need to redeem at 2.3 / 1.5 == 1.53¢/pt. in order to break even, and even then remember that you wouldn’t earn tier qualifying points nor redeemable points on award tickets.
If you can, you should jump on a new cc welcome bonus, perhaps for one of the Chase Ink cards since they have higher minimum spend requirements that the $5k tax payment could cut far into.
Great post on this topic. I’m going to use this current payment period to finish up a new Amex Platinum spend but this takes me back to my recent question on your podcast regarding the CRO crypto cards with up to 8% back and I assume function as a debit card in this case. However, I then realized that the earnings (% back) can be taxed by the IRS as crypto income if the price is higher than acquired. Freaking taxes, so complicated. Can’t we just go to a flat tax?
I suggest updating to suggest two inter-related advantages to over-paying taxes:
2021 Tax Year Due Dates
SHOULD SAY JANUARY 18 as in the update box at the beginning of the post
Can the Point Debit card be used for paying taxes with one of the IRS vendors, and if so, does it code as a “debit card” with the lower $2.00 fee per transaction?
Besides the 4 quarters of estimated federal taxes there is also the final tax for the year. So, right now you can make up to 6 payments (2 per processor) for 2021 (not estimates). Then you can also make estimated taxes for each quarter for 2022.
That comes to 30 payments per year, and if you are married and desperate (surely that could never be the case?) and are willing to risk some potential hassle you can do the trick of each spouse paying separately for twice as many payments – but make sure you can handle the cash flow in case this drags out a refund for months. And this is not even taking into account filing an extension or an amended return …
As always, don’t be too greedy.
Anyone tried to use Vanilla VGC (sutton bank) or Vanilla MGC to pay tax via PayUSA recently? Any success stories? Thanks.
No, but I used Vanilla VGC (metabank) today with no problems at PayUSA Tax.
Thanks. I am not able to find Metabank version Vanilla GC here in bay area safeways. I appreciate if someone can share which grocery store in bay area carries Metabank version Vanilla GC.
Huge F***ing caveat! I set myself up for some spends and needed to manufacturer to cover them. “Loaned” the Government $7,200 by overpaying my taxes on my credit cards in February 2021. It is now 01/07/2022 and my return is still being processed and my refund in on hold. My return is a generic W2 scenario with no creative deductions.
At least you’re earning 3.13% on that money annually. There are no savings account/CDs with a better rate right now.
Seriously? That actually makes me feel better! My only concern is the if/when I get reimbursed.
Still waiting too, but for way less ($500). Glad to know I’m not alone.
From what point do we start to earn that interest? lets say i make a payment now of 100$ for this quarter and file tax in 2023 around March. Can I expect 3$ interest?
Thanks!
You start earning interest after April 15th 2023 or your filing date (which ever is later).
Same here! I paid 11000 get get the chase ink bonus points. Still haven’t received it back. I have called several times and talked to them on phone but they just say due to covid it hasn’t been reviewed. Now I can see that negative amount in 2021 transcript, not in 2022 trascript.
It’s starting to make me nervous, looking back I wouldn’t do it. Too much headache and uncertainty.
I went to make some payments today and found that the ACI Payments debit card fee has raised to $2.20 from $2.00
Thanks. Updated.
Pay1040.com has decreased their CC transaction fee to 1.87%
Thanks. Updated.
I haven’t actually tried using it, but it looks like ACI Payments now offers a PayPal payment option as well. Hopefully there’s more PayPal category bonuses in the future!
delete
Is PayUsaTax.com down?
Sorry if this has been answered already (I couldn’t find it), but can the Point Debit card be used for paying taxes on any of these websites and, if so, does it code and charge as a debit card for the lesser fee?
Here is how to work around the PayPal payment bug on payUSAtax when you’ve already made a previous payment for that tax type/year combo.
Sign up for an account and use the “schedule future payments” feature.
THANK YOU!!!!
Big thanks taxpayer! Can confirm I set this up as you outline yesterday and it went through early today. I did P1’s Marriott Amex card a month ago but was stuck for P2 until coming upon this.
thanks!
“Put in valid credit card information first (for any credit card) and then press the PayPal button. When doing it this way, I got the PayPal screen to successfully load.”
This trick is not working for me. I noticed this is happening to me because i am trying to make a PayPal payment for a second time on the same day (to use a different Freedom card). If I change my SSN slightly then the PayPal popup works.
I will wait a day or two and see if this issue goes away by itself.