A self-employed professional's tax year: VAT and income tax dates, month by month

Stefano, an architect in Turin registered for VAT under the ordinary regime, pays €2,020 of first-quarter VAT in May 2026. Six weeks later his accountant sends him another F24 payment slip for €3,100, covering the income tax balance and the first advance. Nothing in the figures is wrong. Stefano simply never wrote his tax calendar down.

Three families of deadlines

The tax calendar of a freelancer or a small business looks crowded, but it boils down to three families. The first is periodic VAT, on a monthly or quarterly rhythm. The second is income tax, with two big appointments a year. The third covers returns and reports, which involve no payment at all.

The first two families all go through the F24 payment form. Anyone holding a VAT number must submit it electronically only: through the Agency's online services, through the internet banking of an approved intermediary, or through an authorised professional. Walking into a bank with a paper form is not an option for them.

The third family is easily confused with the others, and that is where things get forgotten. Filing the VAT settlement report or the income tax return moves no money, yet each has its own deadline, separate from the payment dates. Having paid does not mean having reported, and the reverse is just as true.

The rhythm of periodic VAT

For most taxpayers VAT is settled monthly. By the 16th of each month you work out the difference between the VAT on the previous month's sales and the deductible VAT on that month's purchases, and pay any amount due with the online F24. Twelve appointments a year, always on the same day of the month.

Businesses with a modest turnover may opt for quarterly settlement. The first three quarters are paid by the 16th of the second month after the quarter ends: 16 May, 20 August and 16 November. The fourth quarter has no date of its own: it is folded into the annual balance, due by 16 March of the following year.

Quarterly filers pay for the convenience: the tax due at each quarterly deadline is increased by 1% as interest. There are also special quarterly filers, such as fuel distributors, road hauliers carrying goods for third parties and health professionals, who do not add that surcharge.

For special quarterly filers the last quarter works differently too. It is paid by 16 February of the following year, net of the December advance, instead of being folded into the March balance. Anyone in one of these categories should mark that February date clearly, because it is easy to overlook.

At year end comes the VAT advance, payable by 27 December by monthly filers, for December, and by quarterly filers, for the last quarter. The three calculation methods are explained in the course on VAT reporting and the annual return; here what matters is that it is a date of its own, right in the holiday season.

The March VAT balance and its options

The balance shown by the annual VAT return is due by 16 March. It does not have to be paid in one go, though. The Agency's page offers four routes, worth knowing before March because they change the spring cash profile considerably.

• Pay the whole amount in one go by 16 March
• Pay in instalments from 16 March, adding 0.33% per month to every instalment after the first
• Pay in one go together with income taxes, adding 0.40% for each month or part of a month after 16 March
• Pay in instalments from the income tax deadline, applying first the 0.40% monthly surcharge and then 0.33% on the instalments

The instalment rules are simple. Instalments are equal, those after the first fall on the 16th of each month, and the last one cannot go beyond 16 December. The interest is fixed and grows with the instalment's rank: the second carries 0.33%, the third 0.66%, the fourth 0.99%, and so on.

The annual return that produces that balance has its own window: for the 2026 VAT return, covering 2025, from 1 February to 30 April 2026, electronically only. Anyone wishing to report fourth-quarter data inside the return, rather than in a separate report, must file by the end of February, which in 2026 meant 2 March.

Income taxes: June and November

For income taxes the calendar turns on two months. Unless an extension applies, the previous year's balance and any first advance for the current year are paid by 30 June. The second or single advance instalment is paid by 30 November. The mechanism itself is explained in detail in the course on IRPEF.

The 30 June deadline has a tail. The balance and the first instalment can also be paid within the following 30 days, with 0.40% added as interest. It is a deferral built into the rule, not a penalty. The Agency's page ties that option to the balance and the first instalment, not to the November deadline.

The split of the advance between June and November is not the same for everyone. For most taxpayers the first instalment is smaller than the second. For taxpayers subject to the synthetic reliability indices, known as ISA, and for flat-rate taxpayers, the two instalments are equal. The second module returns to this point.

The 2026 Redditi Persone fisiche return, covering 2025, can be filed from 15 April 2026; its final deadline, set on 31 October, moves to 2 November because that day is a Saturday. The return is filed electronically only. As you can see, the June payment comes long before the filing deadline.

That mismatch surprises many first-year professionals. It seems natural to file the return in the autumn and pay accordingly; in reality the numbers must be closed by June, because that is when the balance and first advance are paid. The October return formalises calculations already made and already paid.

Reports that are not payments

Anyone settling VAT must also report the data of each periodic settlement, quarter by quarter, electronically. The deadline is the last day of the second month after the quarter, with two exceptions: the second-quarter report is due by 30 September, and the fourth-quarter data can be included in the annual VAT return instead.

Taxpayers who are required neither to file the annual VAT return nor to carry out periodic settlements, such as flat-rate taxpayers, are outside the obligation, as long as those conditions still hold. Where there is nothing to report the duty does not arise, but it does when a credit from the previous quarter has to be carried forward.

The upshot is that May and November hold, for a quarterly filer, two close but different deadlines: the payment on the 16th and the report at month end. Recording them as a single item is the surest way to forget the second just when you think the quarter is closed.

Saturdays, Sundays and public holidays

A date set by law can fall on a non-working day. The Agency's pages apply a shift in several places: withholding tax payments falling on a Saturday or holiday move to the next working day, and the settlement report moves to the next weekday.

The same mechanism appears in the 2026 dates published by the Agency. The end-of-February deadline for a VAT return including the fourth quarter, falling on Saturday 28 February, moved to 2 March. The 31 October deadline for the Redditi return, also a Saturday, becomes 2 November.

In 2026 two VAT payments land on a weekend: 16 May, the first-quarter date for quarterly filers, is a Saturday, and 27 December, the VAT advance, is a Sunday. The pages read for this course do not state the shifted date for those two payments. The prudent rule is simple: pay on the Friday before.

The first-quarter report is affected too: the end of May 2026 is a Sunday, and the rule moving it to the next weekday takes it to Monday 1 June. It is one of the rare cases where the shift is spelled out on the report's own page.

The table leaves out social security contributions, IRAP, local surtaxes and local taxes, which follow their own rules and dates and are not covered here. It is a skeleton: each reader adds the items that apply, but starts from firm dates rather than from a memory of last year.