Reporting and Paying Social Security, Medicare, and Withheld Federal Income Taxes(p79)

You must withhold federal income, social security, and Medicare taxes required to be withheld from the salaries and wages of your employees. You are liable for the payment of these taxes to the federal government whether or not you collect them from your employees. If, for example, you withhold less than the correct tax from an employee's wages, you are still liable for the full amount. You must also pay the employer's share of social security and Medicare taxes.

Report withheld federal income tax, social security tax, and Medicare tax on
Form 943. Your 2011 Form 943 is due by January 31, 2012 (or February 10, 2012, if you made deposits on time in full payment of the taxes due for the year).

Generally, you must deposit both the employer and employee shares of social security and Medicare taxes and federal income tax withheld during the year. However, you may make payments with Form 943 instead of depositing them if you accumulate less than a $2,500 tax liability during the year (line 9 of Form 943 (line 11 for years prior to 2011)) and you pay in full with a timely filed return.

For more information on deposit rules, see Publication 51 (Circular A).

You must use electronic funds transfer to make all federal tax deposits (such as deposits of employment tax, excise tax, and corporate income tax). Generally, electronic funds transfers are made using the Electronic Federal Tax Payment System (EFTPS). If you do not want to use EFTPS, you can arrange for your tax professional, financial institution, payroll service, or other trusted third party to make deposits on your behalf. Also, you may arrange for your financial institution to initiate a same-day wire payment on your behalf. EFTPS is a free service provided by the Department of Treasury. Services provided by your tax professional, financial institution, payroll service, or other third party may have a fee.

For more information on making federal tax deposits, see section 7 of Publication 51 (Circular A). To get more information about EFTPS or to enroll in EFTPS, visit www.eftps.gov or call 1-800-555-4477. Additional information about EFTPS is also available in Publication 966, The Secure Way to Pay Your Federal Taxes.

By January 31, you must furnish each employee a Form W-2 showing total wages for the previous year and total federal income tax, social security tax, and Medicare tax withheld. However, if an employee stops working for you and requests the form earlier, you must give it to the employee within 30 days of the later of the following dates.

• The date the employee requests the form.
• The date you make your final payment of wages to the employee.

If you are responsible for withholding, accounting for, depositing, or paying federal withholding taxes and willfully fail to do so, you can be held liable for a penalty equal to the withheld tax not paid. A responsible person can be an officer of a corporation, a partner, a sole proprietor, or an employee of any form of business. A trustee or agent with authority over the funds of the business can also be held responsible for the penalty.

Willfully means voluntarily, consciously, and intentionally. Paying other expenses of the business instead of the taxes due is acting willfully.

If you classify an employee as an independent contractor and your have no reasonable basis for doing so, you may be held liable for employment taxes for that worker. See Publication 15-A for more information.