When must an FTCA suit be filed after the agency mails final denial?

Section 2401(b) measures the suit component from the agency’s certified or registered mailing of final denial and gives six calendar months. The trigger is not the claimant’s later receipt. Confirm qualifying final denial, exhaustion and any timely reconsideration request before using this ordinary component.

Responsible actor. The claimant commencing the exhausted FTCA civil action.

Preserve the written final-denial notice and certified or registered mailing evidence.

Confirm that the claim was properly presented and the proposed suit follows section 2675.

Check whether a timely reconsideration request changes the procedural posture.

Use for an established written final denial mailed by the agency through the statutory channel. This is not a deadline measured from six months of agency silence.

1. Agency certified or registered mailing date of written final denial
2. For the established federal civil court component, FRCP 6(a)(1) excludes the trigger day and includes intermediate weekends and holidays. A period in months or years uses its corresponding calendar date, rather than a fixed number of days. The final weekend or legal holiday moves forward under Rule 6(a). A target month or year without the corresponding day requires separate endpoint review; this calculator refuses that input.
3. Commence the exhausted FTCA district-court action by filing the complaint. Preserve the court receipt and the agency denial and mailing records.

Retained 2024 annual U.S. Code, laws in effect January 6, 2025. The subsequent-law review covers the retained 119th Congress corpus through Public Law 119-118, approved September 30, 2026. Its scoped candidate findings do not establish every claim-specific exception or later judicial application. This page requires the stated covered cause and legally established event. Court computation uses the retained December 1, 2025 FRCP compilation; identified agency regulations use their separately stated 2026 API editions.

The calendar covers established events and results from January 1, 2025 through December 31, 2033. OPM observations for 2025–2030 are independently checked. Dates in 2031–2033 are standing-rule projections under 5 U.S.C. § 6103, not published OPM schedules. Additional presidential, congressional or district-state holidays, amendments and actual clerk inaccessibility require separate review. Inauguration Day is not treated as a nationwide district-court holiday. The coverage boundary does not establish statutory applicability or lateness.

Fictitious example

Fictitious independently established facts. Use for an established written final denial mailed by the agency through the statutory channel. This is not a deadline measured from six months of agency silence.

Fictitious independently established events and classifications. The displayed result is this one untolled component. Securities earlier-of comparisons and alternative wage classifications are separately identified. These examples do not determine accrual, discovery, statutory liability, the actual forum, an exception, a completed filing or an unrecorded closure. Use for an established written final denial mailed by the agency through the statutory channel. This is not a deadline measured from six months of agency silence.

Reconsideration

A written request timely filed before suit and before the six-month expiration invokes the distinct 28 CFR 14.9(b) agency reconsideration procedure.

Agency inaction

Section 2675(a) permits an established deemed-denial election after qualifying agency inaction; it is not this mailed-final-denial trigger.

Month-end inputs

Six calendar months are not 180 days. Inputs without a corresponding target-month day require specific endpoint review.

Calendar and endpoint coverage

The calendar covers established events and results from January 1, 2025 through December 31, 2033. OPM observations for 2025–2030 are independently checked. Dates in 2031–2033 are standing-rule projections under 5 U.S.C. § 6103, not published OPM schedules. Additional presidential, congressional or district-state holidays, amendments and actual clerk inaccessibility require separate review. Inauguration Day is not treated as a nationwide district-court holiday. The coverage boundary does not establish statutory applicability or lateness.

• Use for an established written final denial mailed by the agency through the statutory channel. This is not a deadline measured from six months of agency silence.
• The calculation supplies the stated component on established facts. Unmodeled tolling, competing components and claim-specific exceptions require separate controlling review.

• Preserve the written final-denial notice and certified or registered mailing evidence.
• Confirm that the claim was properly presented and the proposed suit follows section 2675.
• Check whether a timely reconsideration request changes the procedural posture.
• A written request timely filed before suit and before the six-month expiration invokes the distinct 28 CFR 14.9(b) agency reconsideration procedure.
• Section 2675(a) permits an established deemed-denial election after qualifying agency inaction; it is not this mailed-final-denial trigger.
• Six calendar months are not 180 days. Inputs without a corresponding target-month day require specific endpoint review.
• For this federal civil court component, FRCP 3 uses filing the complaint to commence the action, subject to a specific statutory requirement such as claimant written consent. Under FRCP 6(a)(4), the last day ordinarily ends at midnight in the court’s time zone for electronic filing, or at scheduled clerk closing for other filing. A different statute, local rule or court order can set a different time. Establish the actual court and completed filing; an unsuccessful attempt is not automatically a completed filing. Rule 6(a)(3) concerns actual clerk inaccessibility. Rule 6(d) is not an automatic addition to statutory accrual, discovery, denial-mailing or notice-receipt components.