The IRS has announced that tax-exempt organizations with January and February filing due dates will have until March 30, 2012. If you are affected, you don’t need to file anything to get the March 30 extension as it’s automatic.
The extension only affects a handful of orgs since most charities operate on a calendar year basis and have a May 15 filing deadline. However, orgs with a fiscal year that ended on August 31 or September 30 in 2011 would generally have a filing deadline of January 17, 2012, or February 15, 2012, respectively. Those deadlines are pushed to March 30, 2012. The extension also applies to organizations that already obtained an initial three-month filing extension and now have an extended filing deadline that falls on January 17, 2012, or February 15, 2012.
The extension applies to affected organizations filing Forms 990, 990-EZ, 990-PF, or 1120-POL. Form 990-N filers will not be affected.
So what’s the reason for the IRS’ generosity? Technical stuff, apparently. The IRS notes that part of the e-file system that processes electronically filed returns of tax-exempt organizations will be off-line during January and February 2012 “in order to facilitate systems and programming changes.” The rest of the e-file system – for individual and business taxpayers – is supposed to be fine.
And – I know this is crazy talk – the IRS will also let you file on paper. If your is are normally required to file electronically, you have the option of filing on paper while the electronic filing system is off-line.
Further details are in Notice 2012-4 (downloads as a pdf).
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