Estimated taxes being due this week, thought I would post this payment alternative:
Sure you can pay with a credit card and make money . . . . though not a lot. I can use that CC payment space to better advantage with my side hustle where I get to keep ALL of the profit. The IRS provides a friendly facility to help people in my situation avoid the US Mail. It’s called IRS Direct Pay:
Natch, the payment reaches the IRS via ACH.
Cost to the taxpayer: zero . . . . . except for the tax itself, of course.
Many states also offer a version of this way to pay.
I used IRS Direct Pay for the first time today. Things went quite smoothly. I even was able to schedule the payment for tomorrow, when it’s actually due, leaving a lot of money in my savings for one extra day. Liked that.
In the past I paid estimated tax using a credit card. I got more back via my CC reward than the service fee. But this way I pay no service fee at all. I can use the CC credit thus freed up to buy other stuff (CDs) and pocket the entire reward as opposed to paying a portion of it out as a service fee.
Negative:
Using Direct Pay your payment to the IRS is pretty . . well . . pretty direct. So I lose the payment money out of my bank account straightaway. However:
Whatever I buy instead will still not need to be paid off for many weeks. So it all works out.