David Jeffers

Tax Man Cometh
July 25, 2009

Once upon a time there was a man who loved technology. He believed that technology made every man’s life easier and freed up more time for man. And for the most part this man’s belief was based on solid evidence.

However, his wife was not so enamored with technology, especially when it came to dealing with money. She did not completely trust using a credit card to make a purchase over the Internet and she was very suspicious of using it when dealing with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).

Nevertheless the husband patted her on the head and told her everything would be fine.

The husband filed their tax return electronically and chose the option to send a check in the mail. He received electronic confirmation that all was well in IRS Land.

Then came the letter.

It was somewhat mysterious.

In it was a check from the IRS for $1468.00, which was the exact amount of the check sent to the IRS for the 2008 bill.

The man knew immediately there was something wrong with the check because it had his name on it and the name of his first wife whom he had been divorced from for over ten years.

So this man spent forty-five minutes on the telephone with the nice IRS lady (she was indeed a very nice and helpful woman) to determine that Mr. and Mrs. Taxpayer II 2008 tax payment had been erroneously paid to Mr. and Mrs. Taxpayer I 1993 tax bill. Yes, that is right; somehow the IRS went back fifteen years and decided to apply Mr. Taxpayer’s current tax payment to a bill that not only did not currently exist, but never did exist!

So the nice IRS lady told Mr. Taxpayer to write a note and send the check back to the IRS and everything would be just fine.

And so he thought.

Mr. Taxpayer received a bill earlier this month for $1479.56 for; yes you guessed it, his 2008 tax bill. What is the extra $1.56 for; right again…interest. The interest is actually $4.30 because the original 2008 tax bill was for 1452.00. The IRS originally penalized Mr. and Mrs. Taxpayer II $23.26 for underpayment of taxes.

This is only fair because the IRS always pays us interest for overpayment of our taxes!

Okay, well at least they should!

Mr. Taxpayer II was going to call but something told him to wait because the IRS was probably not finished. Mr. Taxpayer II’s gut told him that the IRS probably had yet to receive the check for the fraudulent 1993 tax overpayment check and once they did they would no doubt send out another letter.

And the IRS did not disappointment.

(Sad how Mr. Taxpayer II listens to his gut and not enough to his wife…)

So today, July 23, 2009, Mr. and Mrs. Taxpayer I (whom are no longer married) received the following letter:

Dear Taxpayer,

We received payments totaling $1468.00 for the tax period(s) shown above [1993]. However, the time allowed by law for collecting the amount due has expired. Therefore, you are under no obligation to make these payments. A further review of your account indicates that you have another outstanding tax liability of $1502.05 [yes, it has increased!] for the tax year 2008. To credit these payments to that tax, you must check the appropriate box below. Then sign and return this notice WITHIN 30 DAYS from the date of this letter.

[ ] apply the payments to this account. (not legally required)

[ ] apply the payments to the _______ tax year liability

I would like to add a third appropriate box:

[ ] bend over and…(oh never mind!)

Of course, I will be using the form and checking box number one because in my vertigo-induced state of mind I figure that this will correct the problem before it gets much bigger than it already is. What of the additional $34.05 (unless it grows bigger…which it no doubt will)?

I will call the nice IRS lady (a different one, of course) on the back of today’s letter and see if I cannot resolve the additional funds, and if the bureaucratic gods are really shining down on me, have my tax record corrected to show that I have paid all of my taxes.

So what is the moral of today’s story?

First, if you can hide from the IRS for 15 years, decide to finally pay your tax bill, they’ll send you your money back.