Minnesota tax law changes went into effect July 1, 2021. The changes relate to unemployment benefits, the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loan waiver, and other retroactive compliance provisions affecting the 2017-2020 tax years.
Revenue is committed to providing updates on the progress of updating our forms, developing and testing our system, communicating with affected taxpayers who need to change their declarations, and providing information on when refunds will be sent to affected taxpayers.
Below is the status of progress as of August 30, 2021:
- Almost 8,000 letters have been sent to individual taxpayers who are required to file an amended declaration in order to obtain the UI and / or PPP loan waivers or to take advantage of other provisions from the tax law amendment. Those who receive this letter should follow the directions on the letter and submit the modified return when they are ready.
- Refunds are already being made to over 2,000 returns affected by company-level PPP changes. These will be published until September. These returns represent a small fraction of the total number of returns affected, do not require system development or testing, and are processed manually.
- We have completed the initial development phase of the system, which is needed to adjust over 540,000 tax returns, and have moved into the testing phase of this process. The uniqueness and timing of this type of system change makes it imperative that we perform the development and testing parts of this process correctly so as to avoid errors that could result in taxpayers missing out on the intended benefits or not receiving the correct amount of the refund. We will provide a timeframe for these refunds to begin once we have completed the testing process.
- In late July, we updated the Minnesota tax forms for the 2020 tax year. If you have not yet submitted a declaration for 2020 or have requested an extension, You can use the updated forms to claim the recently passed Unemployment Exclusions and Deductions, Unemployment Exclusions and Deductions and PPP Loans, as well as other retrospective compliance requirements.
- We have posted the near definitive Minnesota 2021 Income and Corporation Tax Forms on our website. Near-definitive forms are draft and should not be used to submit returns. Additional changes can be made to these forms, including sections relating to federal tax forms. These almost definitive forms are for reference only.