Balance, advances and payments: when and how IRPEF is paid

Paolo, an architect under the ordinary regime, closes his 2025 return with 3,000 € of IRPEF still owed after withholding. He had already paid 2,400 euros in advances. On 30 June 2026, though, he finds he must pay more than the 600 euro balance: the first advance for 2026 arrives with it. Anyone who does not know the mechanism feels taxed twice.

Two ways to pay: through the withholding agent or on your own

An employee who files form 730 and has a withholding agent pays nothing personally. The employer or pension provider deducts from, or adds to, the salary the amounts owed or refundable under the return, starting from the month of July.

Someone who files the Redditi Persone fisiche return, or who files form 730 without a withholding agent, pays on their own instead. Every taxpayer pays taxes with form F24; non-residents have other options too, such as a bank transfer or the Agenzia's online services.

Professionals and sole traders under the ordinary regime belong to the second group. No employer works out and withholds the final settlement for them: they must know how much to pay, by when and under which code. The rest of this module is about them.

The mechanism: one balance and one advance every year

IRPEF is paid as an advance, in one or two instalments, and as a balance. Each year the taxpayer pays the balance for the previous year and the advance for the current one. The two payments do not concern the same income: one closes yesterday's account, the other anticipates today's.

The first year of self-employment is therefore the lightest: there is no declared tax from a previous year, so no advance arises. The second year is the heaviest, because the whole advance for the second year comes on top of the balance for the first. Anyone opening a VAT number should set money aside from day one.

An example makes the effect visible. A professional in their first year, with no withholding suffered, declares 3,000 euros of tax for that year. No advance was paid, so the balance is the whole amount. The following June they pay a 3,000 euro balance and a 1,200 euro first advance: 4,200 euros on a single day.

In November the second instalment of 1,800 euros follows. Over five months 6,000 euros go out, twice one year's tax. That is not double taxation but the mechanism settling in: from the third year on, if income stays level, the balance comes back close to zero.

Withholding tax on a professional's fees

A resident professional who invoices a client acting as withholding agent, such as a company or another professional, suffers a withholding on account on the fees. The client keeps it back on payment and pays it to the Treasury on form F24. For residents the withholding is 20 %.

On account means the withholding is not the final tax. It is a prepayment the professional recovers in the return by subtracting it from net tax. If the withholding suffered exceeds the tax due, the return closes with a refund; if it falls short, tax remains to be paid.

For non-residents working in Italy the rule changes character: the 30 % kept back is a final tax, and it is not recovered in a return. Keep that distinction in mind when comparing two quotes, one from a resident professional and one from a non-resident.

The ActioFin withholding calculator shows how gross fees turn into the net amount collected. What matters here is the next step: a year's withholding is one of the figures the return subtracts before deciding whether a balance is owed and whether an advance arises.

When an advance is owed

An advance is owed if the tax declared in the year, meaning the tax for the previous year, exceeds 51.65 euros once credits, tax offsets, withholding and surpluses have been subtracted. It is a strict threshold: exactly 51.65 euros does not trigger an advance, 51.66 does.

The advance equals 100 % of the tax declared in the year. This is the historical method: for the current year you pay what you declared for the previous one. The administration's reasoning is simple: lacking other information, the coming year is assumed to resemble the one just closed.

Alternatively the taxpayer may base the advance on the lower tax they expect to owe for the current year. This is the forecast method, useful when income really falls: a lost contract, a sabbatical, an illness. The advance calculator lets you compare the two methods side by side.

The forecast method comes at a price: if the forecast proves too optimistic, the advance paid falls short of what was owed. Before choosing it, rely on hard figures for the current year rather than on hope, and keep a record of how the estimate was made.

The example shows why the forecast method should be chosen with figures in hand. If in December Chiara lands a big new client and her 2026 tax climbs back to 3,000 euros, the 2,000 euro advance will turn out too low. The June decision is judged on the whole year.

One instalment or two

If the advance is below 257.52 euros it is paid in a single sum by 30 November of the tax year. If it is 257.52 euros or more it is split in two: 40 % by 30 June, together with the previous year's balance, and the remaining 60 % by 30 November.

Two groups depart from the 40 and 60 split. Taxpayers subject to the synthetic reliability indicators, the ISA, and those in the flat-rate scheme pay two instalments of equal size, and a single November payment up to a threshold of their own of 206 euros. The calculator handles both regimes.

The balance and the end-of-June bill

The balance is what remains of the previous year's tax once that year's withholding and advances are subtracted. If positive, it is paid; if advances and withholding exceed the tax, the return closes with a refund. An employee with a withholding agent gets it through the payslip; others follow the return instructions.

At the end of June the professional therefore pays two different things on the same form F24: the balance of the closed year and the first instalment of the current year's advance. Adding them up in advance, instead of discovering them in June, is the difference between a planned payment and a cash problem.

Alongside these amounts come, for those liable, the surcharges and the social security contributions, each with rules and deadlines of their own. This module does not quantify them, but anyone preparing a June budget must know that IRPEF is not the only line on that month's form F24.

Deadlines and the surcharge for paying later

Unless extended, the balance and any first advance instalment are due by 30 June of the year the return is filed. They may also be paid within the following 30 days, with an increase of 0.40 %. The second or only advance instalment falls due on 30 November.

The 0.40 % increase is not a penalty for lateness but the price of a deferral the rule itself provides. On a payment of 1,800 euros it comes to 7.20 euros. It can be a sensible compromise when cash is tight at the end of June, as long as the second deadline is met.

Extensions, when granted, move these dates for categories of taxpayers. The 30 June and 30 November dates are the rule to start from, but before paying it is worth checking on the Agenzia website whether a postponement has been granted for the current year.

• By 30 June: the previous year's balance and, if the advance reaches the two-instalment threshold, the first instalment
• Within the 30 days after 30 June: the same amounts, increased by 0.40 %
• From July, for an employee with a withholding agent: deductions or refunds through the payslip
• By 30 November: the second instalment, or the only one if the advance is below the threshold

Form F24 in practice

Form F24 is divided into sections. IRPEF, like VAT and withholding, goes in the Erario section; the regional surcharge in the Regioni section; municipal taxes in the section for IMU and other local taxes. Each line carries a tax code and the reference year, written with four digits.

Amounts are always entered with two decimals, even when they are zero: seventy euros is written 70,00. If the computation gives more decimals, round to the cent, upwards when the third digit is 5 or more and downwards otherwise. So 74.955 becomes 74.96.

Anyone holding a VAT number must file form F24 electronically only: through the Agenzia's F24 web or F24 online services, through the home banking of an approved bank, or through an authorised intermediary. A paper form at the counter is not an option for them.

Someone without a VAT number is not bound to the electronic route. They may hand in the paper form at a bank, a post office or the counter of the collection agent, paying in cash or by the other means the Agenzia page lists.

One rule applies to everyone: anyone offsetting a credit, for instance a tax credit arising from the return, must use the Agenzia's electronic services. The same goes for a nil-balance form F24, where the credits offset cover the debts in full.

The ActioFin guide to paying the IRPEF balance and advances walks through filling in the form step by step. This course stops at the computation: how much to pay, by when and why. The form is easy to fill in once those three figures are clear.