Committee advances bill to extend Idaho tax filing deadlines, lower small penalties

The Idaho House Revenue and Taxation Committee on Feb. 24, 2025, voted to send House Bill 92 to the full House with a due-pass recommendation.

House Bill 92 would extend the automatic filing extension for state income tax returns from six months to seven months after the original due date, grant members of the military an automatic 12-month extension to file, eliminate the penalty for tax balances under $50, and reduce the interest applied to past-due amounts from 2% to 1%. The bill does not change payment due dates.

"House Bill 92 is a taxpayer friendly bill that does a few things," Representative Jeff Ehlers, R-Meridian and the bill sponsor, told the committee. "It increases the amount of time from an automatic extension for filing your state taxes, from 6 months to 7 months from the original due date. ... And then, it eliminates the penalty if you have less than $50 due on your taxes."

Matthew Grow, a CPA with Grow Rasmussen and a member of the Idaho Society of CPAs tax committee, told the committee the bill would align Idaho practice more closely with federal automatic extensions and reduce surprises for taxpayers. "Let's just let them have the extension. We'll figure out penalties and all of that as we need to, but let's at least get an automatic extension so we can get that behind us," Grow said in testimony.

Mark Winn, vice president of tax for Lamb Weston and a leader in Idaho tax practitioner groups, described the additional month as an "administrative burden win for tax practitioners and companies in Idaho," saying the extra time helps large corporate filers prepare state returns after federal returns are completed.

An emailed statement read into the record by committee staff, from Frederick J. Nicely, senior tax counsel at the Council on State Taxation, said the bill "will both ease compliance for corporate taxpayers and reduce administrative burdens on the Idaho State Tax Commission" by allowing corporate taxpayers an additional month after the federal extended filing deadline to file state returns.

Representative Monks moved that the committee send HB 92 to the floor with a due-pass recommendation; the motion carried on a voice vote. The transcript records the committee saying "Aye" and that the motion "carries," but no roll-call tally was provided.

The bill's provisions would not change when taxes are due, only when returns may be filed with an automatic extension, and would add explicit protections for military filers, according to sponsor remarks and testimony.

The committee closed public testimony and approved the minutes from recent committee meetings before adjourning. HB 92 now proceeds to the House floor for further consideration.