I'm not an accountant, but I've done some research on this lately. This is what I understand:
Your Tax ID number, more commonly known as the EIN (Employeer Identification Number)is a 9-digit unique identifying number for all Federal tax purposes. It's the business equivalent to an individual's social security number.
The number itself has nothing to do with whether or not you are tax exempt, whether or not you have employees, etc. It's just for identification purposes. An organization fills out IRS form SS-4 to get the number assigned.
The same number is used at the state level, although I think (at least in Texas) they add a digit at the beginning and the end making it 11 digits for state use.
You would use it in formal, usually financial transactions - filing IRS returns, setting up a bank account; at the state level filing for non-profit status or getting licenses/permits.
As a non-profit, if your GROSS revenue is in excess of $25,000, you should be filing an information return with the IRS each year called a Form 990.
Our PTO has a tax ID#, but none of us Board members know what it is for. I'm going to try the IRS email & see if we give them our number can they tell us what it is to be used for. Apparently, an earlier Board got a number but there has been no instructions passes along as to what to do with it. This site has given me some helpful information,thanks.
I thought I'd add this since I've had some email discussions with others struggling with similar decisions. Designating our fiscal year took a bit more thought than I would have first imagined.
The school year here is early August through about the 3rd week of May. To match our budget, we finally choose Aug. 1 - July 31. We thought about June 1 through May 31 to match the officer cycle, but no matter what -it be the next year's treasurer filing the tax return (990s).
The filing is due 5 months and 15 days after the end of your fiscal year (if you have more than $25,000 GROSS income). Not much happens for us during the summer, so ending our fiscal year July 31 puts the filing date at January 15 versus November 15 if we end the year in May. It really doesn't matter much - it's an easy one page form. But this just gives our treasurer more time to take care of it.
When I first filled it out, I thought the right choice on p6 (Sec. III 9) was "e" which requires you to fill out the Schedule D. However, I discoverd that PTO's generally need to select either "h" or "i" as the choice, so no schedule D is filed. We chose "i" since the majority of our revenue comes from "activities related to its exempt functions."
The IRS folks have been VERY helpful. The non-profit (toll-free) line is 1(877)829-5500. Also, to my absolute amazement, I was on hold only 1-3 minutes waiting for "the next available representative." I've probably called them 4 times and each has been a very pleasant experience.
Also, did you visit the www.form1023help.com/
website? They have some very helpful information.
I'm mailing our application in tomorrow. Good luck with yours.
We are in the process of getting our 501(c)3 forms filled out. For anyone who has already doen this we are curious to know if you used the Schedule D 509(a)3, for supporting organizations? Any help you can give us would be much appreciated
