ATF Will Shut Down eForms After Christmas to Retool for Zero Dollar Tax Stamps

As you surely recall, one of the features of Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill that’s near and dear to the hearts of gun owners is the elimination of the $200 tax on suppressors, short-barrel rifles and short-barrel shotguns. No longer will you have to fork over a couple of Benjamins for the privilege of buying a can for your AR or pistol caliber carbine. And if you decide an 11-inch barrel suits your need in a rifle better than one that’s 16 inches or more (18+ inches for shotguns), you won’t have to send Uncle Sam any of your hard-earned dollars.

This welcome change will take effect on January 1.

That means, however, some system tweaks are needed for our friends in ATF’s NFA Division. To make the necessary upgrades to handle the law change, they’re going to shut the eForms system down for Form 1 and Form 4 submissions after Christmas to let their geeks get to work.

From ATF . . .

On December 26, the eForms system will be temporarily unavailable while we upgrade the system to permit reduction to tax rates for certain NFA firearms.

• • The ATF eForm 1 and ATF eForm 4 will be made unavailable on the eForms platform with no new electronic submissions available until January 1.
  • All ATF eForm 1 and ATF eForm 4 applications in a DRAFT status will be deleted from the eForms system.

All completed ATF eForm 1 and ATF eForm 4 applications submitted within eForms before December 26 will be processed before January 1.

This is necessary to implement statutory changes contained within the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which reduced the making and transfer tax for certain firearms to $0. Deletion of all DRAFT applications is necessary because of the field and formatting changes required on the new forms, available January 1. This will also allow ATF to add additional functionality to the Form 4, allowing both qualified licensees as well as other transferors to submit Form 4 applications through the eForms system.

If you’ve ever been through a system change or upgrade, you know that the process seldom goes to plan. Let’s hope ATF has its digital ducks in a row. As noted above, any eForm applications in draft status when the system goes down will be zapped, so act accordingly.

Thank you for your attention to this matter.