The yearly list: 1604-E
Once a year, by 1 March, you send BIR one list of everyone you withheld from. If you kept a running list all year, it's a matter of adding up.
← 5.3 Withholding on rent and suppliersOnce a year, the whole list
Every quarter, Kuting Kitchen reports what it withheld from its landlord. Once a year it sends the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) the whole year in one list: the 1604-E.
It's due 1 March. For 2026, that's 1 March 2027, a Monday.
A report, not a payment
The 1604-E is an information return: the annual return of creditable (expanded) taxes withheld. Nothing is paid with it.
The tax was already paid during the year, on the 0619-Es and 1601-EQs. The 1604-E shows who it was withheld from, and how much.
Kuting Kitchen's list
The list is the alphalist, Schedule 3 on page 2: one line per payee, with Taxpayer Identification Number (TIN), name, the alphanumeric tax code (ATC), the income paid and the tax withheld.
Kuting Kitchen has one payee: the landlord. Rent of ₱30,000 × 12 = ₱360,000; 5% withheld = ₱18,000.
It has to agree with the quarters
Page 1's Schedule 1 lists the year's four 1601-EQs: ₱4,500 each, ₱18,000 in all. That must equal the alphalist's total, and the four quarterly payee lists (QAPs) and four 2307s to the landlord.
If the numbers don't agree, find out why before you file, not after.
How it's sent
The alphalist is a data file, prepared and checked with BIR's Alphalist Data Entry and Validation Module, then emailed to BIR's eSubmission address (esubmission@bir.gov.ph), or attached in eFPS (the Electronic Filing and Payment System) for eFPS filers.
Accounting software that keeps the payee list can produce the file for you.
Not the other 1604s
| Form | Lists | Due |
|---|---|---|
| 1604-C | Employees and tax withheld from salaries (Lesson 8) | 31 January |
| 1604-F | Final taxes withheld | 31 January |
| 1604-E | Expanded withholding, like rent | 1 March |
Kuting Kitchen, with two staff and a landlord, files the 1604-C in January and the 1604-E in March.
If you skip it
Not filing an information return costs ₱1,000 per failure, up to ₱25,000 a year. For micro and small taxpayers it's halved: ₱500, up to ₱12,500.
Kuting Kitchen, with ₱4.8 million in sales, is small. A smaller penalty, but still one to avoid.
Keep a running list
March is easy if the list already exists. Keep a payee register from the first payment: each payee's name, TIN and address, the ATC, and every month's payment and tax.
Ask for the TIN before you pay: it goes on every 2307. The QAP each quarter and the 1604-E each March are then just totals of the register.
Pop Quiz: Elle's year
Elle's shop paid rent of ₱20,000 a month from January to June, then ₱22,000 a month from July to December, withholding 5% each time.
General information for learning, not tax advice. Kuting Kitchen, its landlord and Elle are fictional; the 1604-E shown is BIR's form filled in with sample figures. Penalty amounts are from the Tax Code as amended by the Ease of Paying Taxes Act.
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