Do estimated taxes have to be the same each quarter?

[question everything]

I planned ahead but with the suspension of RMDs and some rollover to Roth things change. I prefer to play with the estimated taxes and end up next April more or less even.

[wryter2000]

1. I don't send the same amount every quarter

I'm no expert, so maybe I'm doing it wrong and they just haven't caught me. I pay estimated taxes on my writing income, and I never know how much it's going to be until I have it.

[question everything]

2. Thanks.

[wryter2000]

3. You should probably wait until some others chime in

As I said, I'm no expert, but it seems to me logical that self-employed people might have different amounts of income in different quarters.

[question everything]

4. I will. Have four more days in this month

[progree]

5. No, but you may have a penalty, and you will have to fill out Form 2210 to annualize

your income (list your income on a quarterly basis) to make the penalty go away. Then, if you use TurboTax, you can't file electronically (federal return) if you annualize. You can eat the penalty and file electronically. (For me my penalty was $3, well worth "eating" the penalty for the convenience of electronic filing.)

On your Minnesota return, if you have a penalty, you can't file electronically. Whether or not you annualize (I had a $1 penalty)

All that happened to me last year, GRRRR GRRRRR GRRRRRR.

Most of my "income" is in December -- I get my one and only annuity check in December, and December is also my month to do my beneficiary IRA RMD and Roth conversions.

This year I just said to hell with it and am paying in the same amount each quarter, so won't have that problem. Though if I make a much bigger Roth conversion than anticipated, I might get screwed again.

Anyway the IRS philosophy is that the April 15 estimated tax payment is supposed to cover Q1 (Jan 1 - March 31), the June 15 estimated tax payment is supposed to cover April 1 - May 31 (2 months), , the September 15 payment covers June 1 - August 31 (3 months), and the January 15 payment covers September 1 - December 31 (4 months),

Edited above that the paragraph to conform to the Kiplinger article I found downthread. Also, I corrected the penalty amounts I owed

[wryter2000]

6. There you go

I'm doing it wrong, and they just haven't caught me. I suspect my penalty would also be something small enough to simply pay.

Before I started making estimated payments, I always was under withheld. The instructions said the IRS would calculate a bill for that and send it to me. They never did, though, and I figure I was just small enough not to be bothered with.

[question everything]

7. Thanks. This is what I thought

When first filed estimated for being self employed, I thought: well, April was for four months, June for two, so I sent less.

But then... hey more than 8 years, I can admit it: when I realized it while entering data on TurbtoTax, I just entered a quarter of the total for each payment...

[question everything]

8. One more point

When first started, I would pay the last quarter in December, not in January. The purpose, at least in the first year, was to include more state taxes to be itemized the following year.

But I thought that the January payment is supposed to take into account the activities during the past year and to adjust accordingly.

[progree]

9. Here's a Kiplinger article on what periods the estimated taxes cover

https://www.kiplinger.com/article/taxes/t056-c005-s001-when-are-2019-estimated-tax-payments-due.html
Its not like what I said before upthread. For example April 15 payment covers Jan 1- March 31 (3 months) as expected. But June 15 covers only April 1 - May 31 (2 months). Then the Sept 15 payment covers June 1 - August 31 (3 months), and the January 15 payment covers Sept 1 - Dec 31 (4 months).

I'm in the process of finding my Form 2210 which should tell me more or less .. thought I had it printed, but nope. Anyway it has all the stuff needed to calculate the penalty, and it's a quarter-by-quarter thing.

I've been paying 4th quarter federal taxes the following January 15, but paying 4th quarter state taxes in December to, like you, deduct them in current year taxes.