Organizations that don’t have to file a 990

Some organizations are exempt from filing any of the Form 990s. If your organization is fortunate enough to be exempt from filing these forms, after glancing through this section, you can safely skip the rest of this chapter - unless, of course, you want to find out how to snoop into the affairs of other organizations using these forms. If that’s the case, skip to the section “Researching Form 990s Online” .
To be sure that your organization is exempt, check out the following list of exempt entities:  

• Small nonprofits: Organizations with annual incomes of $25,000 or less get a free ride, probably because the IRS itself has staffing and cost constraints.

• Faith-based organizations: Just about all faith-based organizations get to skip filing Form 990, regardless of size.

• Subsidiaries of other nonprofits: The IRS believes in nepotism! Any subsidiary organization whose parent organization or national headquarters filed a 990 for the entire organization gets to skip the formalities.

• Nonprofits that aren’t in the system yet: Nonprofits that haven’t applied to the IRS for exemption from federal income tax don’t have to file a Form 990 because the IRS wouldn’t even know who the form is from.

• Religious schools: A school below college level that’s affiliated with a church or operated by a religious order doesn’t have any Form 990 homework.

• Missions and missionary organizations: This category includes a mission society sponsored by or affiliated with one or more churches or church organizations, if more than half of the society’s activities are conducted in or directed at persons in foreign countries.

• State institutions: A state institution that gets a free tax ride because it provides essential government services (a university for example) doesn’t have to file a Form 990.

• Government corporations: A corporation organized under an act of Congress that’s an “instrumentality of the United States” doesn’t have to file a Form 990 because it’s an arm of the government and is exempt from federal income taxes under 501(c)(1).