During the e-file steps you are given three options to pay your taxes due by: credit card, direct withdrawal, or check. When you select to pay by credit card, you are provided a link to https://payusatax.com/taxact, which is a 3rd party site sponsored by the US Treasury to allow taxpayers to make a payment by credit card.

When you click on the link for this site, you are directed to a new page for payUSAtax that is powered by Value Payment Systems (VPS). If you have filed your return but have not paid your taxes owed, you are encouraged to pay them now by visiting https://payusatax.com/taxact or choosing one of the other four options listed at the bottom of this page.

They do charge a service fee for providing the option to pay taxes owed.  Anything additional to your amount due that you paid by your credit card at that website was for use of their service to pay taxes owed. 

Once you have completed the payment you still have to complete the steps for electronically filing the tax return by returning to your TaxAct program and clicking the Continue button. The payment does not submit the return, but rather ensures that your payment is made. The payment options page is only a few pages into the process of electronic filing and was provided before any payment for the software was prompted. There are several steps to e-filing, and the payment for taxes owed is shortly after the start of the e-filing steps.

You can log back into your return to go back through the filing steps. This is where you can review the information about the filing steps, and where you can see that the payment information is provided before the billing and submission steps.

If you confirm you paid taxes owed but did not submit the return, you will still be prompted to choose how you wish to pay the taxes owed when going through the e-filing steps to submit the return.  If this is the case, you may choose to mail a check for taxes owed in order to move past that page in the program.

If you no longer wish to pay taxes owed by credit card, you can find information on other available options below:

1. EFTPS System
   • Pay by Phone or Internet
2. Mail Paper Check
   • Print the Form 1040-V (Payment Voucher) and mail your amount due to the IRS.  Instructions for printing the individual form can be found using the link above.
3. Direct Debit
• Option for Direct Debit from Checking or Savings Account.
4. PayNearMe
• Option for paying with cash at specific retail locations.

We do hope this clears up any confusion about the e-filing process and the payment options that are available to you.