Someone Will File Your Insurance Agency's Taxes. But Who's Finding the Savings?

Someone is going to file your 2026 tax return. That part is handled. The real question is whether anyone is looking for tax savings while there is still time to act on them.

For most insurance agency owners, the answer is no. The return gets prepared in March or April and it records a year that is already over. By then, the decisions that set the number have been made, mostly by default.

The bottom line: Your 2026 taxes are decided by December 31, not April 15. Between now and the end of the year, you still have paychecks, weeks, and options that disappear when the calendar turns. For the example owner below, one move alone is worth about $7,000 this year, and it is only available through a 2026 paycheck.

Three Dates That Run The Tax Year

Today: time to act

Your 2026 numbers can still move. Salary, retirement contributions, withholding, reimbursements, and purchases are all still open. This is the window where planning actually changes the result.

December 31: the year closes

Many of the decisions that affect your tax bill must be made before December 31. Others remain available after year-end, but the longer you wait, the fewer options you have.

April 15: time to report

Your return records what happened. A good preparer can make sure you get every deduction you qualify for. They cannot go back and create the ones you never set up.

What Is Still Open Before December 31

Here is what an agency owner taxed as an S corp can still do this year, and why each one has a deadline.

1. Run your salary through payroll

Your reasonable salary has to actually run through 2026 payroll to count for 2026. If payroll was skipped or uneven this year, the fix is a payroll entry now. (Not sure your number holds up? Start with how much to pay yourself from your agency.)

2. Fund your 401(k) out of your paychecks

Your own 401(k) deferral has to come out of 2026 W-2 paychecks, from a plan that already exists. The 2026 limit is $24,500, plus $8,000 if you are 50 or older, or $11,250 if you are 60 through 63. With monthly payroll, you may have only two or three paychecks left to get it in.

3. Fix your estimates with withholding

To avoid an underpayment penalty, your 2026 payments generally need to reach the smaller of 90% of this year's tax or 100% of last year's (110% if last year's adjusted gross income was over $150,000). If you are short, extra federal withholding on your remaining paychecks is generally treated as paid evenly through the year. A late estimated payment is not.

4. Reimburse yourself through an accountable plan

Home office, business mileage, and your phone are best reimbursed to you by the agency through a written accountable plan, and paid in 2026. For 2026 mileage, the IRS business rate is 72.5 cents a mile for January through June and 76 cents for July through December.

5. Put needed equipment in service

Computers, phones, and furniture count for 2026 only if they are in service by December 31. Buy what you need, not what saves tax. A dollar spent to save 30 cents still leaves you 70 cents poorer.

What Still Works After December 31, and What It Costs to Wait

Some things can still happen after year-end. The agency can generally make an employer retirement contribution until its return is due, including extensions. A SEP can even be opened that late. And if you are not an S corp yet, an election effective January 1, 2027 is due March 15, 2027.

But each of those is smaller, or slower, without the work that happens now. The employer contribution is a percentage of the salary you actually ran in 2026. The S corp election needs payroll and a salary decision behind it before the first paycheck of the year. (Wondering whether it is time? See when an S corp starts saving an agency owner money.)

What One Move Is Worth

Here is one example. Assume a married agency owner in Minnesota whose agency is taxed as an S corp, with $200,000 of profit before owner pay and a $60,000 reasonable salary, about $2,500 a year of S corp compliance cost, and the standard deduction. That salary is an assumption. Yours depends on your role, your hours, and what that work pays where you are.

Deferring the full $24,500 into the agency's 401(k) through the remaining 2026 paychecks saves about $5,390 in federal tax and $1,670 in Minnesota tax, roughly $7,000 this year. The money stays yours, in your retirement account.

Wait until January, and that $7,000 is gone for 2026. There is no catch-up deferral for last year.

Five Questions to Ask Your CPA Before December 31

• What is my projected 2026 taxable income, based on my books through September?
• Are my estimated payments on track for the safe harbor, and if not, how do we close the gap?
• Is my salary where it should be, and has all of it run through payroll this year?
• How much should I defer into my 401(k) from the paychecks I have left?
• What are the things we can still do this year that we cannot do in April?

If those questions don't get attention, or no answer until spring, you have a preparer, not an advisor. They both matter. Only one can still change your 2026 number.

And if you want a second look at what could still change before December 31, book a free discovery call. We work only with insurance agency owners, and we will tell you whether there is something worth doing this year.