Do you have to pay quarterly taxes when you file a 1099, or can you pay yearly?

Question

Hi, my friend is interested in filing a 1099, so she can be an independent contractor for a company. Can she pay her taxes at the end of the YEAR, or is she required to submit income tax payments to the state/feds on a QUARTERLY basis?

Answer 1

There are some good answers above. My point is procedural.

Your friend cannot file a 1099. The Form 1099 is provided to her by the person who pays her. It is the equivalent of a W-2. Every individual files a Form 1040 (or 1040-EZ, etc.). She will report her 1099 income on Schedule C of the 1040.

The term you want is "file as an independent contractor" or "file a Schedule C", not "file a 1099".

Answer 2

Quarterly taxes (Estimated Income) are based upon whether you owe a certain amount of money at the end of the year that exceeds the allowable shortage.
If your Income Tax exceeds a certain amount there will be a Penalty imposed. I would assume that you are making too much money and that you will have to pay additional taxes at the end of the year.
If you have any Idea how much you will have to pay at the end of the year, you must pay quarterly or pay the penalty. Try to keep it in such a way that you will get at least a small refund at the end of the year.

I can't give you specifics, but I pay quarterly because the people I work for do not take out enough withholding tax.

Say that you make enough 1099 money to ow 2000 dollars at the end of the year. You will be required to pay a penalty and that will increase your tax. Better to pay an estimated tax to make sure you don't owe them anything at the end of the year. You can telephone the IRS or write to them for quarterly forms to send in. Save you some trouble that way.

Answer 3

Firstly, your friend may not actually be an independent contractor in the eyes of the IRS. It is not a "choice" as such but is dictated by the terms of engagement with whoever she is working for. Consequently, any write-offs that she takes as a contractor may well be lost if the IRS determines that she is an employee (employee expenses are only deductible to the extent that they exceed 2% of Adjusted Gross Income)

Secondly, please do not believe those who tell you that she can pay yearly without offering any qualification of their statement. Provided tax is paid by April 15th, a penalties and interest will not arise if the total liability is less than $1,000. As someone astutely observed, that will happen if profits are about $7,000 simply because of FICA taxes (unless she also has a W-2 job which earns more than about $90,000 a year).

The other way of avoiding penalties is to, by the end of the tax year, pay in the lesser of:
1. your tax liability for the previous year or
2. 90% of your liability for the current year.
It follows, therefore, that after one year in business, quarterly payments will normally have to be made to avoid interest and penalties if the business is earning a full-time income.

Perhaps those who say they pay yearly either have a part-time business or leave their accountant to figure out their payment on April 15th and don't realize that it includes interest and penalties.

I suggest your friend starts by looking at the link below. If she cannot fathom it out on her own, she evidently needs a CPA or Enrolled agent to advise her professionally. She will find it is money well spent.

Answer 4

Legally taxes are supposed to be paid as income is earned if you do not pay enough in quarterly estimated payments, you may owe penalties and late fees, even it you pay in full by April 15. If you owe less than a certain amount that I didn't bother to look up, no penalties apply.

BTW TaxGuru is correct. It gets irritating to see people using inaccurate terms.

Answer 5

you are required to pay taxes on a quarterly basis, failure to do so could result in an underpayment penalty assessment.
The payment requirement can be accomplished through withholding or quarterly estimates or a combination of both.
If you only have 1099 income you will be required to pay quarterly since yoy don't have withholding.

Answer 6

Nope. You are not required to make quarterly tax payments (although you can). Just pay at the end of the year as usual (or the next year if you want to be techinical).

Remember to tell her to write EVERYTHING off that she can, especially mileage. Do so and you won't owe any taxes. Downside is that you also won't 'officially' have income which can make it harder to get a house etc. (you have to do a 'stated income' loan but that is a different topic).

Answer 7

I got penalize for not paying them quarterly (and I just missed one quoter actually). So pay quarterly to avoid penalties and to avoid paying a large sum of money at the end of the year.

Answer 8

Well, you can pay annually but you might be hit with penalties and interest if you owe a large amount and haven't paid quarterly. I don't remember the exact numbers but here's a link.

http://www.irs.gov/businesses/small/article/0,,id=110413,00.html

Answer 9

If you expect to owe under $1000 at year end then you can wait till year end. Be aware that self employment tax is about 14.3% on net profit so it can easily be over &1000 very quickly (only $6933 or more of net profit)

Answer 10

it depends on how much you make. .

there is an income threshhold, which, if you are above that (if you make more than that a year), they make you (command you to) pay in quarterly (estimated tax for that quarter)