IRS EIN Phone Number: Every Line, Hour, and Answer It Gives (2026)

What is the IRS EIN phone number?

The IRS EIN phone number is 267-941-1099. It answers Monday to Friday, 6 a.m. to 11 p.m. Eastern Time, and it is the one IRS line that assigns a new EIN during the call itself.

The 267 area code is Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and the line is not toll free. A caller pays their own carrier's international rate for the full length of the call, which is the single cost attached to a route where the IRS fee is $0.

One number covers a narrow job, and reading the job correctly saves the call. This line takes applications from entities with no legal residence and no principal place of business inside the United States. An entity based in a US state reaches a different IRS line and receives a different answer, covered further down this page.

Existing-EIN questions travel a separate path again. Recovering a number already assigned, requesting Letter 147C, or confirming a name-and-number pairing runs through the IRS Business and Specialty Tax Line published on irs.gov rather than through the application line.

Three IRS contact points therefore exist around one 9-digit number: the application line at 267-941-1099, the two fax lines at 855-641-6935 and 855-215-1627, and the domestic tax line on irs.gov. Every route ends at the same 9 digits.

What hours does the IRS EIN phone line answer?

Monday to Friday, 6 a.m. to 11 p.m. Eastern Time. That is 17 hours a day across 5 days, or 85 hours a week. The line does not answer on Saturday, Sunday, or a US federal holiday.

Seventeen hours is wider than it sounds from outside the United States. The window opens at 11 a.m. in London, 12 p.m. in Berlin, 2 p.m. in Dubai, 3:30 p.m. in Delhi, and 6 p.m. in Singapore, so a founder in any of those cities reaches the line inside their own working day.

The close is what catches people. Eleven p.m. Eastern is 4 a.m. the next morning in London and 11 a.m. the next morning in Sydney, which places the Australian caller's convenient hour on the far side of the IRS week. A Friday-evening call from Sydney lands on Saturday local time and reaches nothing.

Eleven US federal holidays close the line each year on top of the weekends. All 11 observed dates in 2026 fall on weekdays, including Independence Day observed on Friday, July 3, so 11 holidays plus 104 weekend days removes 115 calendar days and leaves 250 days a year on which the line answers at all.

The online assistant runs a narrower window still, Monday to Friday, 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. Eastern, one hour shorter at each end. The two fax lines accept a transmission 24 hours a day, and the 4-business-day processing clock starts when the IRS opens the queue.

Can you get an EIN over the phone?

Yes, on one route. An applicant with no legal residence and no principal place of business in the United States calls 267-941-1099 and the IRS assigns the EIN during the call. No other phone route issues a new number.

The call reads Form SS-4 aloud. The assistor works down the same fields the paper form carries: the legal name on line 1, the mailing address on lines 4a and 4b, the responsible party and their identifying number on lines 7a and 7b, the entity type on line 9a, and the reason for applying on line 10.

Completing the form before dialling is what turns a long call into a short one. An assistor reading from a blank page waits for every answer, and the questions arrive in the form's order rather than the order a founder thinks in.

The person on the call has to be authorised. The IRS releases the number to the responsible party named on line 7a, or to a third party the entity has authorised in writing on Form 2848 or Form 8821. An assistant with the paperwork but no authority receives nothing.

The number arrives spoken, not printed. The assistor reads the 9 digits back on the call, and the official IRS CP-575 confirmation letter follows separately by mail. Banks verify the CP-575, which is why a spoken number and a delivered document are two different milestones.

Which IRS EIN route fits your case?

Six routes exist and each answers one question. One line assigns a new EIN, two fax numbers accept Form SS-4, one web tool issues in 15 minutes, one line reissues an existing number, and one office issues nothing.

Sources, verified July 2026: IRS, How to Apply for an Employer Identification Number (EIN) for the phone line and its hours; IRS, Where to File Your Taxes for Form SS-4 for both fax numbers; IRS, Apply for an EIN Online for the assistant hours. The IRS fee is $0 on every route in this table.

What number do US-based applicants call for an EIN?

None. The IRS runs no EIN application phone line for entities based in a US state. That applicant uses the online assistant on irs.gov, which issues the number inside a 15-minute session at a cost of $0.

This is the single most searched-for number that does not exist, and the honest answer saves a wasted call. The online route is faster than any phone route anyway: 15 minutes against a queue, with the EIN displayed on screen at the end of the session.

The online assistant carries three conditions. It runs Monday to Friday, 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. Eastern. It requires the responsible party to hold a valid SSN, ITIN, or EIN. It issues one EIN per responsible party per day, which caps a founder registering several entities at one number every 24 hours.

The session also ends after 15 minutes of inactivity, and an ended session restarts from the first screen with nothing saved. Assembling the SS-4 answers on paper first is what keeps a single session sufficient.

The IRS Business and Specialty Tax Line published on irs.gov handles the questions a US-based caller genuinely has by phone: a lost number, a 147C request, an entity-status question. It handles no new applications.

Which IRS number do you call about an EIN you already have?

Call the IRS Business and Specialty Tax Line listed on irs.gov from inside the United States, or 267-941-1099 from outside it. Either route reissues an existing EIN to an authorised person through Letter 147C.

Letter 147C is the replacement for a lost CP-575. The IRS does not issue a second CP-575, ever: the original prints once, at assignment, and every later confirmation the IRS sends is a 147C instead. A bank that asks for the CP-575 accepts the 147C in its place.

Identity checks come first on that call. The assistor confirms the legal name exactly as the IRS holds it, the address of record, and the caller's role as responsible party or authorised representative. A name recorded as LLC in IRS records and given as L.L.C. on the call fails the match.

Delivery runs two ways. The IRS faxes the 147C during the call when the caller supplies a fax number, and mails it otherwise. The mailed copy travels to the address of record, not to the address the caller gives on the phone, which is why an unreported move blocks the letter.

Check the cheaper sources before dialling anything. A prior-year federal return, an old bank account application, a filed Form 1099, or a state licence application each carry the 9 digits, and reading one of those costs $0 and takes minutes rather than a queue.

What do you need before calling the IRS about an EIN?

A completed Form SS-4, the exact legal name the entity registered, the mailing address, the responsible party's name and identifying number, the entity type, and the reason for applying. The IRS asks for each in the form's order.

Line 7b is the field that decides a no-SSN application. A responsible party without an SSN or ITIN enters the word Foreign on line 7b, and the application is complete. No passport, no identity document, and no US visit enters the process at any point.

The legal name has to match the formation document character for character. A mismatch between the state filing and line 1 is the most common cause of a rejected EIN application, and it produces the same rejection whether the form arrives by phone, by fax, or online.

Line 10 asks why the entity is applying, and the answer changes nothing about the number. Started new business, banking purpose, hired employees, and compliance with IRS withholding regulations are all accepted entries, and all four produce the same 9 digits.

Keep a pen on the call. The assistor reads the EIN once. Writing it down as it is spoken, then reading it back digit by digit, is the whole quality-control step, and the 2-digit prefix and 7-digit body separate at the hyphen.

When does the IRS EIN line open in your timezone?

The line opens at 6 a.m. Eastern and closes at 11 p.m. Eastern. That is 11 a.m. to 4 a.m. in London, 3:30 p.m. to 8:30 a.m. in Delhi, and 8 p.m. to 1 p.m. the next day in Sydney.

Converted from the IRS hours of 6 a.m. to 11 p.m. Eastern Time, Monday to Friday, published by the IRS in How to Apply for an Employer Identification Number (EIN), verified July 2026. Offsets are taken at 6 a.m. Eastern Daylight Time, which is 10:00 UTC. Local clocks shift with daylight saving in each region.

All 7 cities in that table see the line close on the next local day, so the end of the IRS Friday always lands on a Saturday local date. Sydney is the extreme case: the Friday window runs from 8 p.m. Friday to 1 p.m. Saturday local, which places none of the IRS week inside a Sydney working day.

Singapore carries the opposite constraint. The line opens at 6 p.m. local, so a Singapore founder calling during their own working day reaches a line that has not opened yet. The window that sits inside the same Singapore date is the 6 evening hours from 6 p.m. to midnight; the remaining 11 hours run on into the next local morning.

The fax numbers hold neither limit, because both accept a transmission 24 hours a day and the 4-business-day clock starts on the next IRS working day.

How long is the wait on the IRS EIN phone line?

The IRS publishes no wait-time commitment for the EIN lines. It states on its Telephone Assistance page that wait times are longer on Mondays and Tuesdays, which leaves the middle of the week the shorter side of the same 85-hour window.

Volume concentrates where the week starts. Three business days sit between Wednesday and Friday, and those 51 line-hours fall outside the 2 days the IRS names as its longest.

The same Telephone Assistance page names two further peaks: Presidents Day weekend in February and the period around the April filing deadline. Those are the only high-volume windows the IRS puts in writing, and 3 of the 5 weekdays sit outside every one of them.

The opening hour is arithmetic rather than advice. The line opens at 6 a.m. Eastern, which is 11 a.m. in London, 12 p.m. in Berlin, and 3:30 p.m. in Delhi, so the first of the 17 daily hours already sits inside office time across Europe and much of Asia.

A queue has one property worth planning around: it consumes the caller's day, not the IRS clock. The fax route at 855-215-1627 consumes 4 business days of calendar and 5 minutes of attention, which is the trade a founder with a bank appointment is actually making.

What are the IRS EIN fax numbers?

Two lines: 855-641-6935 for an entity with a principal place of business inside a US state, and 855-215-1627 for an international applicant. The IRS returns the EIN within 4 business days when Form SS-4 carries a return fax number.

The return fax number is the whole mechanism. Form SS-4 has a field for it, and the IRS faxes the assigned EIN back to that number. A form sent without one gets no fax reply, and the answer then follows the mail timetable of 4 weeks instead.

Four business days spans 6 calendar days when the transmission crosses a weekend. A form sent Thursday returns the following Wednesday. A form sent Monday returns Friday of the same week, which is the shortest calendar path the fax route offers.

Both fax lines accept a transmission 24 hours a day, which removes the timezone problem entirely. A founder in Singapore sends the form at 9 a.m. local time with no regard for whether an IRS assistor is awake.

Choosing between the two numbers is a question about the entity, not the person. An entity with its principal place of business inside a US state uses 855-641-6935 even when its owner lives abroad. The international line, 855-215-1627, is for the entity with no US state address.

Which IRS phone numbers are not the EIN line?

The individual taxpayer line, the tax-exempt organisations line, and the state secretary of state office are three routes that answer no EIN application question. States issue no EINs at all, because the EIN is a federal number.

The individual taxpayer line handles personal returns, refunds, and notices addressed to a Social Security Number. An EIN question reaching it gets transferred, and the transfer costs the caller their place in the first queue.

The secretary of state is the most expensive wrong turn, because it feels correct. A state office issues the formation document, the state entity number, and the certificate of good standing. The EIN comes from the IRS alone, and no state office assigns, looks up, or reissues one.

Registered-agent and formation companies field the same call daily and forward it to the IRS. A company that filed an entity's articles holds the state paperwork, and it holds no authority over a federal number the IRS assigned.

One rule sorts every case. If the question concerns 9 digits printed as 2 and then 7, the answer sits with the IRS. If it concerns a certificate, a state number, or an annual report, the answer sits with the state.

What does an EIN cost on each route?

The IRS charges $0 on every route, by phone, fax, mail, and online. An EIN never renews, so the cost in year 2 and every year after is $0. Paid services charge for preparation and filing, not for the number.

Reference prices verified July 2026 from each provider’s published rate. The IRS fee is $0 on every route.

What else do people ask about the IRS EIN phone number?

Ten questions come up most: the number itself, its hours, whether it is toll free, whether a caller without an SSN qualifies, the wait, what to prepare, lost numbers, the fax route, authorised callers, and the deadline case.

Where do the IRS EIN phone facts on this page come from?

Five primary sources. Four are IRS pages carrying the phone number, the fax numbers, and both sets of hours. The fifth is the federal holiday calendar, which fixes the 11 days the line stays closed.

• How to Apply for an Employer Identification Number (EIN) · Internal Revenue Service · verified July 2026
  The international line 267-941-1099 and its hours of 6 a.m. to 11 p.m. Eastern, Monday to Friday; fax return in 4 business days; mail return in 4 weeks.
• Apply for an Employer Identification Number (EIN) Online · Internal Revenue Service · verified July 2026
  Online assistant hours of 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. Eastern, Monday to Friday; the 15-minute session limit; the limit of one EIN per responsible party per day.
• Where to File Your Taxes for Form SS-4 · Internal Revenue Service · verified July 2026
  The fax numbers 855-641-6935 for a US-state entity and 855-215-1627 for an international applicant.
• Telephone Assistance Contacts for Business Customers · Internal Revenue Service · verified July 2026
  The Business and Specialty Tax Line and its hours; the statement that wait times are longer on Mondays and Tuesdays, over Presidents Day weekend, and around the April filing deadline.
• Federal Holidays · US Office of Personnel Management · verified July 2026
  The 11 US federal holidays and their 2026 observed dates, including Independence Day observed July 3.

Prices on this page come from ein-number.com’s own published rate and from each other provider’s published rate, verified July 2026.

Would you rather skip the IRS EIN call entirely?

The IRS charges $0 and every route above stays open to you. We prepare Form SS-4, file within 1 business day, and deliver the EIN and CP-575 within 7 business days, or the $99 refunds automatically.

Business days are Monday to Friday, excluding US federal holidays.

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