I filed my tax as Single

[amul 229]

2 hours ago, August97 said:

https://ttlc.intuit.com/questions/2567672-can-a-married-person-claim-head-of-household-filing-status

 

And this is from the official IRS site:

 

https://www.irs.gov/individuals/international-taxpayers/u-s-citizens-and-resident-aliens-abroad-head-of-household

Thank you

[Voided 55]

You're welcome

[mcdull 474]

I don't know if those who said you are fine are either out of their kind or on drugs.

 

No, you cannot be married and file as single. If IRS didn't catch you, USCIS will.  

 

And nobody should try to outsmart the gov, for example, if your tax return record has massive discrepancies than IRS tax transcript, they will find out sooner or later.

 

What happened to honesty these days?!

[mcdull 474]

4 hours ago, pushbrk said:

What changes is the tax obligation, not the income or any other financial information.  Other than the always one or more persons who just can't abide the idea of any small error, the concern that need not concern anybody is whether the Consular Officer will think the filing status of Single indicates ANYTHING negative about the relationship bona fides.  I assure you, they don't.  It's part of both their TRAINING and EXPERIENCE.

I am wondering who is your assurance's underwriter? 

[Seth And Quynh 77]

If i filed single and want to ammend to married filing seperately would my whole 1040x be the same as my single tax transcript but the only thing that changed was the filing status?

[sy1983 31]

Go to H&R block, they will do it for Free or apply for it yourself online. 
Either way, even as simple as APPLYING for ITIN you are already able to file for taxes and have something to show to USCIS and IRS
It also depends on what stage of the processing you are in and how much you made. 
Personally, I was on my NVC stage when I filed for my taxes which means I had to show my support and Co-sponsor's and total our income. 

NVC will look at it and as long as you are showing the correct filing although incomplete, its fine. They might just ask you to bring the tax return to the interview.

Never ever cheat the government, its gonna bite you in the rear eventually. Pay $80 at H&R block, they will take care of everything and if something goes wrong they are responsible and not you . 
 

[NBA16 55]

You can file married but separately and write NRA (non resident alien) for ITIN or SSN, That's what we did. But you can't file online that way

[amul 229]

6 hours ago, pghknr said:

Wife is in another country, How ITIN number she will get?  @sy1983

My husband is in India and I applied for his ITIN with our joint return. Had to file a paper return because of this, but was worth it. Just received his ITIN. 

[amul 229]

7 hours ago, sy1983 said:

I went through the same exact situation and had a specialist look into my case. It turns out, if you want to file properly ( not saying your's is wrong or anything) and avoid any possible problem during the interview in the embassy.

You must retract your current filing and apply an ITIN number for your wife in lure of SSN and file as married. It is possible that the interviewer would ask why you filed single and not married when you are clearly married. 
Even spouse that live in different countries must file either joint or separate.  USC that live and earn in another country are still required to pay taxes to the US gov. 

No matter who said what, I knew that having even one "unusual" filing/thing in our case wasn't going to help us. So I did it the hard way. Spent our time and money and filed it properly (for us)!

 

Had to do a paper return and wait for weeks. Had to pay taxes when I could have saved a lot of money by filing Head of Household etc etc. 

 

No need to add a red flag where there isn't one, is my motto! 

[pushbrk 13,370]

7 hours ago, sy1983 said:

Go to H&R block, they will do it for Free or apply for it yourself online. 
Either way, even as simple as APPLYING for ITIN you are already able to file for taxes and have something to show to USCIS and IRS
It also depends on what stage of the processing you are in and how much you made. 
Personally, I was on my NVC stage when I filed for my taxes which means I had to show my support and Co-sponsor's and total our income. 

NVC will look at it and as long as you are showing the correct filing although incomplete, its fine. They might just ask you to bring the tax return to the interview.

Never ever cheat the government, its gonna bite you in the rear eventually. Pay $80 at H&R block, they will take care of everything and if something goes wrong they are responsible and not you . 
 

First, applying for an ITIN for a spouse living abroad is not simple at all.  Second, filing single instead of married does not cheat the government.  If anything, you over-pay your taxes when you do that.  NVC and the Consular officer don't care about this subject in the least.

[aura009 1]

38 minutes ago, pushbrk said:

First, applying for an ITIN for a spouse living abroad is not simple at all.  Second, filing single instead of married does not cheat the government.  If anything, you over-pay your taxes when you do that.  NVC and the Consular officer don't care about this subject in the least.

 

 

 

Spoken the truth...Thank you.

You can always fill out married once your spouse comes to US. Its not like you are hiding any income from US government.

[pushbrk 13,370]

8 minutes ago, aura009 said:

 

 

 

Spoken the truth...Thank you.

You can always fill out married once your spouse comes to US. Its not like you are hiding any income from US government.

This subject usually gets beaten to death earlier in the year.  I expect it has.  The same arguments get repeated each time it come up.  In nearly 12 years of membership here, I have yet to see any member post that a Consular Officer even mentioned the filing status during the interview.  Not only do they not care about it (because why ask why when you already know why) but they also know the foreign visa applicant is unlikely to know anything about filing status anyway.

I did have an IRS employee tell me privately, that AS and IRS employee, he could lose his job for filing with the wrong status, so he went through the trouble of doing the W7 for the ITIN.  He also confirmed that (as common sense would tell us) the IRS doesn't care a whit if non-employees file with a status that has them over-paying their taxes either.

[pushbrk 13,370]

12 hours ago, sy1983 said:

I went through the same exact situation and had a specialist look into my case. It turns out, if you want to file properly ( not saying your's is wrong or anything) and avoid any possible problem during the interview in the embassy.

You must retract your current filing and apply an ITIN number for your wife in lure of SSN and file as married. It is possible that the interviewer would ask why you filed single and not married when you are clearly married. 
Even spouse that live in different countries must file either joint or separate.  USC that live and earn in another country are still required to pay taxes to the US gov. 

What do you mean by "a specialist"?  I can assure you I am personally a fiance and spouse immigration "specialist" and in 12 years, I've never heard of any Consular Officer asking about tax filing status during a fiance or spouse visa interview.  (Sure, it's "possible")

[Ksenia_O 696]

14 hours ago, amul said:

May I ask the source of this info? Those 5 conditions apply to me, so I'm curious now. I filed MFJ and applied for a ITIN for my husband (which we just received). 

 

Thanks. 

You filed correct. Besides, MFJ , usually, is more beneficial - gives you a higher standard deduction, than HOH, And again - being married, you filed your Taxes, using CORRECT filing status, MARRIED,  so I would just leave it as it is. 

[Voided 55]

20 minutes ago, Ksenia_O said:

You filed correct. Besides, MFJ , usually, is more beneficial - gives you a higher standard deduction, than HOH, And again - being married, you filed your Taxes, using CORRECT filing status, MARRIED,  so I would just leave it as it is. 

So if filing MARRIED is CORRECT, then would my HOH status be incorrect? I met all the criteria and didn't see it as an issue until this thread popped up now I am curious.