Labor Law Center Blog » Blog Archive » Arizona (AZ) W-4 Form

Arizona (AZ) W-4 Form

August 18th, 2006 Posted by Cara

As most of us know, if a person is working and earning a wage, they must pay income taxes to both federal and state governments, and the state of Arizona is no exception… but, how much should be withheld from each person’s income for state income taxes? Fortunately, there is a very simple form to help each employer determine that.

In addition to the federal income tax withholding form, W4, each employee needs to fill out an Arizona State income tax withholding form, A-4. This form has a different method of estimating tax withholdings than the federal form does and needs to be filled out separately in order to make sure you have the correct percentage of federal withholding for each employee that should be used to calculate their state withholding. It sounds complicated, but the form is actually quite easy to use.

Please take note! If no state income tax withholding form is filled out, taxes must be withheld at the highest level possible – 34.4% of the employee’s federal income tax withholding – even if the employee is known to have exemptions. To prevent things like this from happening, I cannot stress the importance of having each employee file a state withholding form A-4 as well as a federal Form W-4 enough, so please make their completion a priority.

In some cases, a federal W-4 form can be used in the place of an Arizona State A-4 form, but it is highly recommended to have both on file. The Arizona W-4 Form is currently available.

In the state of Arizona, there is an instance when the employee may be exempt from paying state-level income tax, and that is: when a non-resident performs services for an employer within Arizona but is a resident of California, D.C., Indiana, Oregon, or Virginia, AND the employee anticipates having no Arizona tax liability because they can claim an Arizona tax credit for income taxes paid to their state of residency.