Paying your children's taxes

I routinely do my children's tax returns and I pay their taxes with a personal check made out to the IRS. Is this considered a gift, subject to gift tax if it exceeds 11k?

Nephron,

It is good that you do the taxes, and then pay the tax bill.

Do your children have jobs and withholding?
Do your children make quarterly payments?

If their tax bill is in the $11K range they should be doing one or depending on income sources both.

The answer may depend on the filing status of your children. If filing MFJ, then your check for more than $11K would be considered a gift to both tax payers. Thus the gift to one of them would be less than $11K, unless you are writing the check for more than $22K.

But another consideration is if you give your child $11K, you can not give them another gift of any kind or size throughout the year with out creating the need for gift tax reporting.