For the estimated 4 million New York state taxpayers who haven’t filed their income tax returns yet, many in the North Country, Commissioner of Taxation and Finance Jerry Boone wants to remind them about the free options available.

The Tax Department’s "e-file for free" initiative allows those with federal adjusted gross income under $62,000 to save the expense of hiring a preparer or purchasing software by filing both their federal and state income tax returns at no cost.

Easy to use software available on the Tax Department website https://tax.ny.gov/pit/file/file_a_return.htm walks the taxpayer through the simple filing process one step at a time. Taxpayers accessing “free” software can only be sure that they won’t be charged unexpected fees if they use the options available on the Tax Department website.

Of the six million returns reported filed as of March 30, 97% were filed electronically, the state tax office reports. The number of paper returns decreases annually as more discover the benefits of e-filing. E-filing is faster, safer, and more accurate than filing paper returns. And E-filers can receive their refunds twice as fast, the tax department said.

Automatic encryption protects personal and financial information.

User-friendly software does the math for taxpayers, reducing the error rate by 20% compared with paper returns.

New York taxpayers have three extra days to file their personal income tax returns this year. This year’s deadline is Monday, April 18, 2016. That’s because Washington, DC, celebrates Emancipation Day on Friday, April 15, 2016, pushing the filing deadline to the following Monday for most of the nation, including New York State.

If taxpayers don’t believe they can file their returns within that time, they must file for an automatic six-month extension. An extension doesn’t provide more time to pay taxes owed. Taxpayers must pay the properly estimated amount of tax owed when requesting the extension.