Form 8038-G Instructions: Filing, Deadlines, and Corrections

To file Form 8038-G, a governmental issuer completes the paper return using the figures from its bond closing documents and mails it to the IRS Service Center in Ogden, Utah by the 15th day of the second calendar month after the quarter in which the bonds were issued.¹ The return satisfies the information reporting requirement of Internal Revenue Code Section 149(e), and interest on the bonds cannot be excluded from federal income tax unless it is submitted.²

Who Files Form 8038-G

Any governmental entity issuing tax-exempt bonds with an issue price of $100,000 or more files Form 8038-G. That covers state governments, local municipalities, agencies, and special districts. Issues with a price below $100,000 go on the consolidated return, Form 8038-GC, instead.³

The obligation sits with the issuer, not a borrower or conduit entity receiving the financing. For a lease or installment sale, the lessee or purchaser is treated as the issuer. A missed filing does not just create issuer-side penalties; it can make bondholders’ interest taxable, which is usually the larger problem.²

The Filing Deadline and Address

The due date is the 15th day of the second calendar month after the close of the calendar quarter of issuance.¹ In practical terms:

Bonds issued January through March: due May 15.
Bonds issued April through June: due August 15.
Bonds issued July through September: due November 15.
Bonds issued October through December: due February 15 of the following year.

The form cannot be filed before the actual issue date, and it must reflect the facts as of that date. Mail the completed return and any attachments to:

Department of the Treasury
Internal Revenue Service Center
Ogden, UT 84201¹

There is no electronic filing option. Issuers can use a designated private delivery service from DHL Express, FedEx, or UPS to qualify under the timely-mailing-as-timely-filing rule, but only specific service tiers on the IRS list count. Standard ground shipping does not.⁴

Documents to Pull Before You Start

Almost every field on Form 8038-G maps to a document produced at closing. Before opening the form, gather the official statement, the bond purchase agreement, the tax certificate (sometimes called the tax compliance agreement), and any arbitrage or yield calculations from the financial advisor. The tax certificate carries the yield, the weighted average maturity, and the issuer’s spending expectations, all of which feed directly into Parts III, IV, and VI.¹

The issuers who run into deadline trouble are usually the ones assembling numbers from scattered sources a few days before the due date.

Part I: Issuer Identification

Part I collects the basics. Lines 1 and 2 take the issuer’s legal name and Employer Identification Number. The issuer is the entity actually issuing the bonds, not another entity benefiting from the financing. If the issuer has no EIN, one can be obtained online at IRS.gov/EIN or by filing Form SS-4.¹

Line 3a authorizes an outside individual, such as bond counsel or a paid preparer, to communicate with the IRS about the return. This field takes a person’s name, not a firm’s. Line 7 is the issue date, meaning the first date the issuer physically exchanges bonds for the underwriter’s funds; for a lease or installment sale, it is the date interest starts to accrue. Line 9 asks for the CUSIP of the bond with the latest maturity, or “None” if the issue has no CUSIP. Line 10a requires the name and title of an officer or employee of the issuer whom the IRS can call, and it must be completed even when Line 3a lists an outside contact.

Part II: Type of Issue

Part II identifies the governmental purpose of the bonds. Enter the issue price on the line matching the purpose category. If proceeds will be used by an organization other than the issuer, attach a schedule listing each user’s name, EIN, a short description of the use, and whether the user is governmental or nongovernmental.¹

Elections referenced in Part II, such as designating bonds as Tax Anticipation Notes or Revenue Anticipation Notes, are made in the original bond documents at closing. The form only reports them.

Part III: Description of Bonds

Part III is where the numbers live. Line 21 has five columns.⁵

Column (a), final maturity date: the last date on which the issuer must redeem the entire issue.
Column (b), issue price: determined under the rules in the form’s Definitions section, not simply the par amount.
Column (c), stated redemption price at maturity: the sum of the stated redemption prices for every bond in the issue. Write “N/A” for a lease or installment sale.
Column (d), weighted average maturity: for each maturity, multiply the issue price by the number of years to that maturity (accounting for mandatory redemptions), sum those products, and divide by the total issue price. Report in years to at least two decimal places.
Column (e), yield: the discount rate that makes the present value of all principal and interest payments equal the purchase price, including accrued interest. Carry to four decimal places (for example, 5.3125%). For variable-rate issues, write “VR.”

The weighted average maturity calculation catches first-time filers more than anything else on the form. Bond counsel or the financial advisor typically provides this figure in the closing tax certificate, which is the easiest place to pull it from.

Part IV: Uses of Proceeds

Part IV breaks down how proceeds will be spent. The IRS uses the data to monitor private business use and arbitrage compliance. For a lease or installment sale, write “N/A” next to the Part IV title.⁶

Line 24, issuance costs: proceeds used for issuance costs, including trustee and bond counsel fees. If none, enter zero rather than leaving the line blank.
Line 25, credit enhancement: proceeds used for credit enhancement fees that factor into the yield, such as bond insurance premiums or certain letter-of-credit fees.
Line 26, reserve fund: proceeds allocated to a reasonably required reserve or replacement fund.
Lines 27 and 28, refunding: proceeds used to pay principal, interest, or call premium on prior tax-exempt bonds (Line 27) or prior taxable bonds (Line 28), including amounts funding escrow accounts. Any amount on these lines means Part V must also be completed.

Parts V and VI: Refundings and Miscellaneous Items

Part V applies only when proceeds refund a prior issue. Report the remaining weighted average maturity of the refunded bonds, calculated the same way as Line 21 column (d) but without regard to the refunding, along with the issue date of each refunded issue in MM/DD/YYYY format. If the refunding covers multiple prior issues, list each.⁷

Part VI covers several items that issuers often move past too fast. The most consequential is the construction issue penalty election on Line 40. If the issue qualifies as a construction issue, meaning at least 75% of available construction proceeds will fund construction owned by a governmental unit or a 501(c)(3) organization, the issuer can make an irrevocable election to pay a penalty instead of rebating arbitrage earnings.⁸ The penalty is 1.5% of the available construction proceeds that miss certain spending benchmarks at the end of each six-month period after issuance.⁹ The election has to be made on or before the issue date, and the penalty payments themselves go on Form 8038-T, not on Form 8038-G.

Part VI also handles hedge identification, guaranteed investment contract reporting, pooled financing details, and any remedial action or arbitrage compliance procedures in place. These items do not apply to most straightforward governmental issues, but skipping a box that does apply can produce trouble later.

Signing the Return

An authorized representative of the issuer must sign the form before it is filed, and the instructions require the signer’s name and title to be printed. This is typically a finance director, treasurer, or other officer with authority to bind the issuer. Even when Line 3a lists a paid preparer or bond counsel as an authorized contact, an officer of the issuer still has to sign.

If You Miss the Deadline

A missed deadline is not automatically fatal. Revenue Procedure 2002-48 lets the IRS grant an extension when the late filing was not due to willful neglect.¹⁰ The steps:

Complete the form and mail it to the Ogden Submission Processing Center at Ogden, UT 84201 as soon as the failure is discovered. Print “Request for Relief under Section 3 of Rev. Proc. 2002-48” across the top.
Attach an explanation letter signed by someone with knowledge of the facts. It should say when the form was originally due, what led to the failure, how the failure was discovered, and whether the bond issue is currently under IRS examination.
Wait 90 days. If the IRS does not respond within 90 days of receiving the request, relief is deemed accepted and the Section 149(e) reporting requirement is treated as satisfied.

If the IRS finds the failure was willful, it will issue a preliminary adverse determination that interest on the bonds is not excludable from gross income, and the issuer can then pursue an administrative appeal. File the late return as soon as the miss is discovered; the longer the gap, the harder it becomes to argue the delay was not willful.

Fixing an Error After Filing

Errors caught after a timely filing can be corrected on an amended Form 8038-G. Revenue Procedure 2002-48 explicitly allows this: once the required statement has been timely filed, an issuer that finds an inaccuracy may submit an amended statement to fix it.¹⁰ Mark the corrected form as an amended return, mail it to the same Ogden, UT 84201 address, and include a brief explanation identifying what changed and why.

Common triggers for amendment are incorrect issue prices from last-minute repricing, wrong CUSIPs, and miscalculated weighted average maturities. Catching these promptly is far simpler than dealing with them during an IRS examination years later.

When the Problem Is Bigger Than the Form

Form 8038-G handles reporting, not substantive tax violations. If proceeds were used in a way that breaks federal tax rules, the Tax Exempt Bonds Voluntary Closing Agreement Program lets an issuer approach the IRS proactively and resolve the violation through a closing agreement rather than waiting for an audit. VCAP applies to tax-exempt bonds, tax credit bonds, and direct pay bonds, and the resolution typically involves a payment while the bonds keep their tax-exempt status.¹¹ Issuers considering VCAP should bring in experienced bond counsel early, because the submission requirements are detailed.

1
Internal Revenue Service. Instructions for Form 8038-G (Rev. October 2021)
2
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 USC 149 – Information Reporting
3
Internal Revenue Service. Form 8038-G (Rev. October 2021)
4
Internal Revenue Service. Private Delivery Services (PDS)
5
Internal Revenue Service. Instructions for Form 8038-G (10/2021) – Part III Description of Bonds
6
Internal Revenue Service. Instructions for Form 8038-G (Rev. October 2021) – Part IV
7
Internal Revenue Service. Instructions for Form 8038-G (Rev. October 2021) – Part V
8
Internal Revenue Service. Instructions for Form 8038-G (Rev. October 2021) – Part VI
9
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 USC 148 – Arbitrage
10
Internal Revenue Service. Rev. Proc. 2002-48
11
Internal Revenue Service. TEB Voluntary Closing Agreement Program