In United States of America the filing of taxes is mandatory as per law and is an annual affair. Both State and Federal Government have their respective tax systems and qualifying individuals and entities must file their returns to both separately in most of the cases. The standard deadline to file federal income tax return each year is April 15th, therefore typically the tax season in United States would start with the beginning of New Year. Government has different forms for different category of tax payers which they need to fill and submit as their annual tax. These forms are available at various government agencies or can also be downloaded from the internet.

The Internal Revenue Service department which is more popularly known as IRS handles all federal tax related activities throughout the country. IRS is branch of branch of US federal government which functions directly under Department of Treasury. A tax return filed with IRS contains information related to the computation of the income, tax liability and deductions. Along with the same one also needs to pay for their due share of tax. As majority of population is working as salaried or wage earners their employers are entrusted with the responsibility to provide details pertaining to income earned by the employees by the means of Form W-2 and 1099. Most of the information required by a salaried individual to file his/her taxes is available in this form. For people those who have multiple sources of earnings may use different forms to file their tax returns to the federal government.

The process of computing tax and filing it kept as simple as possible by the IRS so that most people do not face difficulty in filing their tax. However still many would like some assistance in doing so. Such people have the option of taking help from a registered Tax Preparer or a CPA. Most of the information and process of filing of income tax has become electronic and can be done through the official website of IRS for free.

Every citizen of the country and the expats those who are earning and living in America have to file their tax returns. For people those due to different reasons cannot file their tax returns on time can also apply for a six month extension. Such an extension can give them extra time to prepare and file their returns.