Mailing tax return near April 15 deadline comes with risk

If you are planning to mail in your 2025 tax returns This 12 months, one element could make the distinction between submitting on time and lacking the deadline: a postmark.

While April 15 is when federal (and most state) taxes are due, the IRS considers any tax return postmarked on or earlier than that date as being filed on time, even when it isn’t acquired by the company till days later. A postmark reveals the date your mail was processed and traditionally had been utilized the identical day you mailed an merchandise.

However, because of ongoing operational modifications on the US Postal Servicethe day you mail an merchandise will not be when a postmark is utilized.

“The core issue is that taxpayers assume the day they drop a return in the mailbox is the day it gets postmarked,” stated Joshua Youngblood, founding father of The Youngblood Group in Dallas and an IRS enrolled agent. “That has never been guaranteed, but it matters more now than ever.”

As the Postal Service continues a multiyear overhaul of its operations to shore up its funds and modernize its infrastructure, the company expects a rise in delays between if you mail one thing and when it receives a postmark, in accordance with a rule published in the Federal Register that took impact Dec. 24.

Due to lowered pickups at many postal areas and elevated journey occasions for mail to achieve regional processing facilities the place postmarks are utilized, “the postmark date does not inherently or necessarily align with the date on which the Postal Service first accepted possession of the mailpiece,” the rule reads.

Although the Postal Service stated within the discover that it’s not modifying how mail is postmarked — that has at all times been achieved at its processing services — the company added language to its Domestic Mail Manual to make clear the difficulty.

Part of the issue is that modifications to transportation schedules and the consolidation of processing services imply many publish places of work that beforehand despatched mail twice a day to a hub now achieve this solely as soon as within the morning, in accordance with research from the Brookings Institution printed in December. Additionally, about 26% of publish places of work are inside 50 miles of their regional middle, and one other 26% are between 150 and 500 miles away, in accordance with the analysis.

The upshot is that some mail typically does not begin transferring by way of the system till not less than the subsequent day, during which case the postmark will not replicate the date you mailed the merchandise. In some circumstances — ie, forward of weekends or holidays — it might take longer for it to be utilized.

“To ensure that your tax return receives a postmark on the day you mail it, ask a retail associate at a post office retail counter to hand-cancel it for free,” the Postal Service advises on its website.

Although households more and more use digital choices to file taxes, pay payments and deal with different private companies, there are nonetheless individuals who use the Postal Service for time-sensitive mail, together with tax returns.

So far in 2026, by way of March 27, the IRS had received 88.4 million tax returns. Of these, 1.6 million weren’t filed electronically. In 2025, of the 165.8 million tax returns acquired by the IRS, about 10.9 million were not e-filedin accordance with the company.

For particular person tax returns — ie, your Form 1040 — the penalty for submitting a late return is 5% of the tax due for every month or partial month the return is late, capping out at 25%. On prime of that, the penalty for paying late is 0.5% of your unpaid stability per 30 days, additionally capped at 25%. Interest can also be charged on unpaid balances, accruing every day on the federal short-term price plus 3%.

However, if in case you have filed and paid taxes owed on time over the earlier three years, you’ll be able to request that the penalties be waived, Youngblood stated.

If you propose to mail your tax return, do not depend on metered postage or self-service kiosk labels, he stated.

“Those show when the postage was printed, not when [the Postal Service] took possession,” Youngblood stated.

While it is free to ask a postal clerk to manually postmark your tax return, Youngblood stated, you may also think about using licensed mail, which costs $5.30.

“This gives you both proof of mailing and a reliable date stamp,” he stated. “It is the gold standard for anyone mailing something deadline-sensitive to the IRS.”

Alternatively, to certificate of mailingwhich you retain to your information, prices $2.40 and reveals the date you mailed one thing. There are additionally non-public supply companies out there that the IRS will accept correspondence from, Youngblood stated.