Taxpayers now have until July to file most federal and many state tax returns due to the COVID-19 pandemic. But not all federal forms for returns were extended.

Filings that were due on March 16, which include forms 1065, 1065-B, 1066 and 1120-S, were among those not postponed.

“We suspect [that’s] because the original deadline for filing had passed when the IRS issued” the postponement, said Nathan Pliskin, senior manager at Mazars USA in New York. “Moreover, those returns are eligible for an automatic six-month extension and, as returns for pass-through entities, no federal income tax payment is required with the filing.”

Any income tax liability flows through to individual or corporate returns that the IRS already extended, he added.

The postponement “doesn’t extend the filing of employment taxes [Form 941] and related payroll forms. It also doesn’t extend excise returns [Form 720],” added Steve Wittenberg, director of legacy planning at SEI Private Wealth Management in Oaks, Pa.

It also “does not appear” that the deadline to file Form 3520 is postponed—yet that deadline is generally linked to the due date of the related income tax return, Pliskin said.

Phyllis Jo Kubey, an enrolled agent in New York, suspects that more guidance from the IRS is on the way. The American Institute of CPAs has requested that all federal income tax returns and payments originally due March 3 to July 15 be bumped to a July 15 deadline, she added.

The IRS has posted notices on the changed deadlines.

These are among other changes in IRS filing relief:

• Estimated quarterly taxes. The payment deadline for the first-quarter 2020 taxes has been extended to July 15. Payment for the second quarter of 2020 taxes remains due on June 15 and “may be a trap for the unwary if taxpayers incorrectly assume all 2020 estimates have been postponed,” Pliskin said.

• Form 990T (Exempt Organization Business Income Tax Return). If due to be filed on April 15, it has been postponed to July 15. Filings due May 15 haven’t been postponed. “Returns that are information tax returns but not income tax returns aren’t postponed,” Pliskin added.

Extra time to file federal taxes by Oct. 15 (the normal six-month extension) will be accepted through July 15.

“Most confusing is the impact on states and localities. Every state has different deadlines ... and many haven’t extended,” Wittenberg said.

Some state tax returns are due the same day as the federal return; other state returns are due one month later. If “the IRS hasn’t extended a deadline, the due date for the respective state return may also not be extended,” said James McGrory, CPA and shareholder at Drucker & Scaccetti in Philadelphia. “Best to confirm with each state’s department of revenue.”

“Clients who customarily set up direct-debit payments for returns and estimated tax payments will have to adjust, particularly those who already set up these payments in advance for April 15,” Kubey said. “I’m advising clients who aren’t experiencing financial hardship to keep normal due dates for their payments.”

Filing and payment deadlines have been pushed from April to July 15 for forms 1040, 1040-SR, 1040-NR, 1040-NR-EZ, 1040-PR and 1040-SS; the 1041, 1041-N and 1041-QFT; the 1120, 1120-C, 1120-F, 1120-FSC, 1120-H, 1120-L, 1120-ND, 1120-PC, 1120-POL, 1120-REIT, 1120-RIC, 1120-SF; the 8960 and the 8991.

The filing deadline for Form 709 (gift and generation-skipping transfers) was also extended to July 15. “These [returns] were traditionally extended with the 1040. The IRS heard the protests and kept the due date compatible with [the] 1040,” said Mary Kay Foss, a CPA in Walnut Creek, Calif.