Tax prepayments in Germany: the four dates, the amounts, and how to change them.

If you earn money that no employer taxes through payroll, such as freelance fees, business profit or rent, the Finanzamt usually collects income tax in advance: a quarter of the expected year's tax on each of 10 March, 10 June, 10 September and 10 December. The amount follows your last tax assessment, or, in your first year, the income you estimated when you registered. Prepayments are only set from 400 euros a year. You can ask to lower them when income drops, or to raise them to avoid a large bill later. After the year, the assessment counts every prepayment towards the actual tax, and the difference is a back payment or a refund.

1. What prepayments are, and who pays them

German income tax is assessed after the year ends. For employees, payroll tax covers it during the year. Everyone else pays during the year through prepayments (Vorauszahlungen) on the income tax they will probably owe for the current year (§ 37(1) EStG). That mostly means the self-employed, landlords and people with large investment or side income. Employees can be asked for prepayments too, for instance when payroll tax doesn't cover their tax (H 37 EStH).

The Finanzamt sets them in a prepayment notice (Vorauszahlungsbescheid). The notice also covers the solidarity surcharge where it applies, which is only on higher incomes (§ 3 SolzG). A prepayment notice is always issued "subject to review" (Vorbehalt der Nachprüfung), so it can be changed at any time, in either direction (§ 164 AO).

Prepayments are not VAT. If you charge VAT, you also file VAT advance returns yourself, monthly or quarterly; the VAT returns guide covers those.

2. The four dates, and paying late

Income tax prepayments are due on 10 March, 10 June, 10 September and 10 December (§ 37(1) EStG). They are equal instalments, even if your income comes in unevenly over the year (H 37 EStH).

A bank transfer counts as paid on the day the money reaches the Finanzamt's account, not the day you send it. With a direct debit mandate (SEPA-Lastschrift), a payment counts as made on the due date (§ 224(2) AO).

Paying late costs a late-payment surcharge (Säumniszuschlag) of 1% for each month or part of a month, on the overdue amount rounded down to the nearest 50 euros. Up to three days late is let off, except for payments in cash or by cheque (§ 240 AO). A month's delay on a 2,000-euro instalment costs 20 euros.

3. How the Finanzamt sets the amount

The starting point is your last assessment: the income tax it set, minus tax already withheld, such as payroll tax (§ 37(3) EStG). If your last assessment came to 8,000 euros of income tax and nothing was withheld, prepayments would normally be 2,000 euros a quarter.

The Finanzamt can adjust them to the tax it now expects for the year, until the end of the 15th month after the year ends: for 2026, until 31 March 2028 (§ 37(3) EStG). It can still do so after you have filed the return for that year (H 37 EStH). Some deductions, such as donations and medical costs, are left out of the calculation unless together they exceed 600 euros.

The limits (§ 37(5) EStG):

• prepayments are only set if they come to at least 400 euros a year and 100 euros per date;
• they are only raised if each date goes up by at least 100 euros;
• a raise for a year that has already ended is added to that year's last instalment, due within one month of the notice, and only if it comes to at least 5,000 euros (§ 37(4) EStG).

4. Your first year: your own estimate

When you start freelancing or open a business, you register with the Finanzamt through the registration questionnaire (Fragebogen zur steuerlichen Erfassung), online through ELSTER, within one month of starting (§ 138(1b) and (4) AO). It asks for the income you expect in the year you start and the year after (ELSTER help). With no assessment to go on yet, the Finanzamt sets your first prepayments from those figures. The registration guide walks through the questionnaire.

It's an estimate, and either direction has a cost. Too high, and money you need for the business sits with the Finanzamt until the assessment. Too low, and the tax you didn't prepay arrives later, all at once.

That "all at once" is the part that surprises people. The first assessment can arrive well into your second or third year, and because the rules fit together, it can bring several payments together: the back payment for the first year, due one month after the notice; higher prepayments for the following years, which now follow that assessment; and possibly a catch-up for a year that has already ended (section 3). Putting money aside from the start, or raising prepayments early (section 5), spreads that out.

5. Asking to lower or raise them, with a letter to copy

Because a prepayment notice is subject to review, you can ask for a change at any time (§ 164(2) AO). Mein ELSTER has a form for it, the application to adjust prepayments (Antrag auf Anpassung der Vorauszahlungen); a letter works too.

• To lower them, show that your income this year will be lower than the last assessment suggests: your figures for the year so far and a realistic estimate for the rest. Prepayments follow the tax expected for the year, so lower expected income is the reason that counts, not a shortage of cash. If the year then turns out better, the difference is due with the assessment, and interest can run on it (section 6).
• Short of cash, not income? That is a different route: asking to defer payment (Stundung). The Finanzamt can grant it where paying on time would be a considerable hardship, normally on application and against security, and charges interest of 0.5% a month for the deferral (§ 222 AO, § 234 AO, § 238(1) AO).
• To raise them, ask in the same way. That avoids one large back payment later. You can also simply pay more: interest is not charged on payments you make before the assessment if the Finanzamt accepts them and counts them towards the tax (§ 233a(8) AO).

An application is not the same as an objection (Einspruch). An objection against the notice is also possible, within one month of receiving it (§ 355 AO); the objection guide explains when that route matters.

The letter below asks to lower prepayments. It is in German, which is what the Finanzamt expects. Replace the parts in square brackets.

Betreff: Antrag auf Herabsetzung der Einkommensteuer-Vorauszahlungen [Jahr]
Steuernummer: [Ihre Steuernummer]

Sehr geehrte Damen und Herren,

ich beantrage, die Vorauszahlungen zur Einkommensteuer für das Jahr [Jahr] auf [Betrag] Euro je Quartal herabzusetzen.

Begründung: Meine Einkünfte im Jahr [Jahr] werden voraussichtlich deutlich niedriger sein als bei der letzten Veranlagung, weil [kurzer Grund, z. B. „ich seit [Monat] weniger Aufträge habe“]. Ich rechne mit Einkünften von etwa [Betrag] Euro. Eine Aufstellung meiner Einnahmen und Ausgaben vom [Datum] bis zum [Datum] füge ich bei.

Mit freundlichen Grüßen
[Ihr Name]
[Ihre Anschrift]

6. Interest

Prepayments themselves carry no interest (§ 233a(1) AO). Interest comes in at the end, on the difference between the assessed tax and the prepayments that were set:

• it starts 15 months after the tax year ends: on 1 April 2027 for 2025, and 1 April 2028 for 2026. For 2024 it started later, on 1 June 2026 (Art. 97 § 36(3) EGAO);
• the rate is 0.15% for each full month, 1.8% a year, and part months don't count (§ 238 AO);
• it runs until the assessment takes effect, and it works both ways: a refund earns interest at the same rate, but only from the day you paid the money.

An example: an assessment for 2025 that takes effect on 15 September 2027 and leaves 10,000 euros to pay carries five full months of interest (April to August): 10,000 × 0.15% × 5 = 75 euros. The late-payment surcharge from section 2 is a separate thing: it applies when a set amount isn't paid on time.

7. How it squares up in the annual assessment

The assessment (Steuerbescheid) sets the actual tax for the year and credits everything already paid towards it: the year's prepayments and any tax withheld (§ 36(2) EStG). Then (§ 36(4) EStG):

• Too little paid: the rest is a final payment (Abschlusszahlung), due one month after the notice is deemed received. Any prepayments that fell due and weren't paid are due at once.
• Too much paid: the difference is refunded after the notice.

A notice sent by post within Germany, or electronically, is deemed received on the fourth day after it was sent (§ 122(2) and (2a) AO). Because prepayments follow the last assessment, a new assessment usually means new prepayment amounts too, up or down. If you think the assessment is wrong, the one-month objection period starts at the same point; see the objection guide. Filing the return on time helps here too: the deadlines guide has the dates.

8. Trade tax and corporation tax prepayments

Income tax isn't the only tax paid in advance.

• Trade tax (Gewerbesteuer) is paid by businesses that run a trade, not by Freiberufler. Its prepayments go to the municipality on 15 February, 15 May, 15 August and 15 November, each normally a quarter of the last assessed trade tax, and only if at least 50 euros (§ 19 GewStG). For a new business, they follow the expected figures. See the trade tax guide and Freiberufler or Gewerbe.
• Corporation tax (Körperschaftsteuer): a GmbH or UG pays its own prepayments on the same four dates as income tax, because the income tax rules apply to it (§ 31 KStG). The company taxes guide covers the rest.

Where it gets complicated: a first year with uneven income, a switch between employment and self-employment, income from abroad, or a business with both income tax and trade tax prepayments running at once. What to put in an estimate, or whether an application to lower prepayments is realistic, is something a Steuerberater works out from your own figures.

The short version