I don’t get a lot of first class mail these days in my home mailbox – mostly store flyers and bulk mail solicitations stuffed with calendars, greeting cards and address labels. Or the occasional birthday or Christmas card.
My business address is used to collect checks, so I don’t usually see money in my home mailbox. No, when I see a regular number 10 envelope arrive, it is usually somebody wanting money – like the IRS.
I got one of THOSE letters on Friday and am on hold right now to try to clear it up. I’ll probably have to drop off before someone answers and will try again later.
The last time this happened, the IRS had mistakenly added a zero when entering the information from one of my 1099’s – instead of noting that I had earned $5,600 from one client that year, it ended up as $56,000.
After a flurry of phone calls and faxes, between me, the client and the IRS, the IRS agreed that it had been their error and didn’t charge me any additional tax or penalties, but it took a chunk of time and some stomach churning before figuring out what had happened.
This time it appears that one of my Quarterly Estimated Tax payments wasn’t credited. However, in order to prove that I did pay that installment, I will need to have an old bank dig through my now closed account to make a copy of the check – which will cost me some money no doubt.
Monday morning is probably not the best time to try to reach the IRS, so the only result of the time I am spending on hold right now will likely be the permanent ear wig of their on-hold music. I am also able to carefully analyze the vocal nuances of the female voice saying “Our representatives are still helping other customers, please continue to hold.”
Of course, there is the possibility that it is my error. I have said more than once that it would be great to have a bookkeeper!
Hi Connie,
A couple of years ago this happened to me, the IRS did not credit my quarterly tax payment. It had gone to the wrong SS number. I looked up the check on-line and on the back of the check was a SS number that was not mine. I got the IRS on the phone, spent about a half hour with a very nice lady and she took care of it. Having information from the back of the check made all the difference. The IRS did their job and I was a happy camper
Mike
How about a pay for performance (very capitalistic, you must agree) program. If an IRS agent accidentally adds a zero to part of your return, they should be required to add one to their return. Then, calculate the difference in taxes that would be owed and return that amount to the tax payer whose return was calculated incorrectly… all without adding the “revision payment” as a source of taxable income. The number of return audited in error would be dramatically reduced.
As it turns out, it was my own bookkeeping error this time. I double counted my first quarter payment. If I hadn’t closed out that bank account a couple of months later, I probably would have figured it out sooner, but as it was I nearly forgot completely about that old account and only at the last minute remembered that it probably had some deductions!
What a pain in the neck. Poor thing! I also wish I had a bookkeeper (and a secretary, a lady in waiting, and a cabana boy).