Find out what the tax return extension consists of 2:47 (CNN) — The day has come. This Monday, April 18, is the deadline to file the tax return in the United States with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), at least for most of its citizens. It should be remembered that for some taxpayers there is a longer term to file taxes. Among them are residents of Maine and Massachusetts, where the official date is April 19. In addition, people who live in areas declared disasters by the federal government and taxpayers who are living outside the US as of this date have an extended term of one month or more after this April 18. For everyone else, there is no more deadline. They must file their tax return this Monday if they do not want to incur penalties for failure to file, which can range from a maximum of 25% of their outstanding balance for those who owe large amounts, to a minimum of US $ 435 dollars or the 100% of your tax debt for those who owe smaller amounts. However, if you definitely can’t file your tax return this day because you didn’t prepare it well or simply didn’t make it, there’s good news: You can avoid penalties by requesting an extension to file taxes at a later date. How to extend the deadline for your tax return? What you need to have an extension on your tax return is form 4868. “A citizen or resident of the United States files this form to request an automatic extension of time to file a United States personal tax return,” says the IRS about said form. Form 4868 mentions that there are three ways to request the automatic extension (which is six months for everyone in general and four months if the resident is outside the country): The first way is by paying part or all of the estimated tax on the income owed by the taxpayer in question. To obtain the extension, it must be indicated that said payment is for an extension. The second is by filing Form 4868 electronically “through the IRS e-file program or through a professional tax preparer who uses that program,” the document states. And the last option is to present the form 4868 on paper. Optionally, you can attach the tax payment that you estimate you owe. Here you can find information in Spanish on these three options. Requirements to obtain the extension Form 4868 indicates that the following three requirements must be met: “Correctly estimate the amount of taxes you owe for 2021 using the information that is available.” “Enter the total amount of taxes you owe on line 4 of form 4868.” “File form 4868 by the due date of the normal delivery period for your statement (which is this April 18).” Be careful with this: requesting an automatic extension for your declaration does not give you an extension to pay your taxes. “Although you are not required to make a payment on the tax due that you have estimated, Form 4868 does not extend the time to pay taxes. If you do not pay the amount due by the normal due date, you will owe interest. In addition, you may have to pay fines,” the document warns. For more information on what happens if you don’t pay your taxes due today, click here and go to the question that says “What happens if I don’t pay on time?”.