Tax questions (split)

[TaskenLander 13]

Hello there,

I am in a somewhat similar situation. My wife's I-130 petition was officially approved this previous Thursday (June 08, 2023). I tried filing my taxes 'married jointly' online via TurboTax (she is still living in Japan), but I was unable to file due to not having an ITIN number for her. I filed for an extension and had her fill out a W-7 form and mail it to me along with an international driver's license and her country's equivalent of a birth certificate.  Her filled out W-7 form and corresponding documents arrived finally and now I wish to get this and my federal taxes mailed out ASAP, but I have a few burning questions still if I may ask here:

• After numerous attempts, I was able to *finally* finish my taxes on Turbo Tax and save as a PDF for mailing but after a careful examination of them, it says on the final page marked 'ELECTRONIC POSTMARK - CERTIFICATION OF ELECTRONIC FILING', "Your return has been rejected by the IRS". Does it just say this, because I had to fill in all 9's for my wife's social security number to be able to submit? If I mail in what I have now, will they (my 2022 taxes) still be accepted?
• And secondly, the instructions on the IRS website say to leave the social security field for the spouse that you are applying an ITIN number for blank -- but clearly I had to put all 9's in to be able to (attempt) to file. Will this qualify my taxes (or at least my ITIN application) rejected??

Any insight into this would be GREATLY appreciated; I am quite vexed what exactly to do and time is officially ticking... 😓

 

Thank you in advance.

[prohias 3]

I need you to clarify something. Normally you have to file the W-7 *with* a completed tax return. 

 

Did you not do that and just submitted the W-7 by itself?

[prohias 3]

23 hours ago, pushbrk said:

That's what I would expect.  Proof of mailing is not proof of WHAT you mailed, so would be useless anyway.

Yes, I know that.

 

I was just trying to help others in case they were concerned that they needed to provide proof of mailing as well as a copy of the return.

[TaskenLander 13]

 

7 minutes ago, prohias said:

I need you to clarify something. Normally you have to file the W-7 *with* a completed tax return. 

 

Did you not do that and just submitted the W-7 by itself?

 

I have yet to submit anything. I just received her filled out and signed W-7 and corresponding documents in the mail. I wish to mail out ASAP but want to make sure I am doing so properly. I have my completed PDF Turbo Tax tax federal form printed and ready to attach with it (the W-7), but am worried about my wife's social being plugged in as '999-99-9999' on them as one IRS agent has now told me to leave it blank but I cannot change it online and save and print. Is it fine? Do I need to reprint my tax forms (have yet to officially mail either) and re-write by hand? Please and thank you in advance.

Edited June 12, 2023 by TaskenLander

[prohias 3]

34 minutes ago, TaskenLander said:

 

 

I have yet to submit anything. I just received her filled out and signed W-7 and corresponding documents in the mail. I wish to mail out ASAP but want to make sure I am doing so properly. I have my completed PDF Turbo Tax tax federal form printed and ready to attach with it (the W-7), but am worried about my wife's social being plugged in as '999-99-9999' on them as one IRS agent has now told me to leave it blank but I cannot change it online and save and print. Is it fine? Do I need to reprint my tax forms (have yet to officially mail either) and re-write by hand? Please and thank you in advance.

I don't think you're going to like my answer (and it may not be true).

 

But because of the Turbotax issue (which I also encountered), my conclusion was that there is no way to file as jointly married through Turbotax AND file a W-7 at the same time. Yes, you could use 999-99-9999 as the social, but it's supposed to be left blank for the ITIN application.

 

And, annoyingly, Turbotax will not let you file jointly married without a SS# entered.

 

What I wound up doing was going through H&R Block, specifically to someone certified as an IRS "acceptance agent" for the purposes of filing a W-7 and a return. Yes, I had to pay about $300 for the filing fee, but the benefit is that you don't have to send in any of your spouses documents (license, passport, etc.). They just make copies of it at the H&R Block office.

 

You'd have to call H&R Block to find which one has someone who is an IRS "acceptance agent". That's what I did and there was only one office who employed someone with that certification. 

Edited June 12, 2023 by prohias

[prohias 3]

1 minute ago, prohias said:

I don't think you're going to like my answer (and it may not be true).

 

But because of the Turbotax issue (which I also encountered), my conclusion was that there is no way to file as jointly married through Turbotax AND file a W-7 at the same time. Yes, you could use 999-99-9999 as the social, but it's supposed to be left blank for the ITIN application.

 

And, annoyingly, Turbotax will not let you file jointly married without a SS# entered.

 

What I wound up doing was going through H&R Block, specifically to someone certified as an IRS "acceptance agent" for the purposes of filing a W-7 and a return. Yes, I had to pay about $300 for the filing fee, but the benefit is that you don't have to send in any of your spouses documents (license, passport, etc.). They just make copies of it at the H&R Block office.

 

You'd have to call H&R Block to find which one has someone who is an IRS "acceptance agent". That's what I did and there was only one office who employed someone with that certification. 

Alternatively, you could do your taxes by hand and file the W-7 with it.

 

Honestly, I was too worried about making sure the process was done correctly that I felt better about using H&R Block even though it costed money. The acceptance agent there knew all about W-7s and had done this kind of thing before. And you get a big tax benefit for filing as jointly married, so it was worth it. 

[TaskenLander 13]

29 minutes ago, prohias said:

Alternatively, you could do your taxes by hand and file the W-7 with it.

 

Honestly, I was too worried about making sure the process was done correctly that I felt better about using H&R Block even though it costed money. The acceptance agent there knew all about W-7s and had done this kind of thing before. And you get a big tax benefit for filing as jointly married, so it was worth it. 

 

Thank you for your feedback. I'm sorry; I misspoke (my wife and I were sure to leave her social blank on the W-7 form), just my 1040 Federal & State tax return has all 9's in the spot for her social. Does that matter greatly? Wouldn't they be able to see that we don't have a social for her at time of mail filing along with a W-7 application?  I suppose it wouldn't be the *worst thing to have to start over and print by hand but I'm wary I'll miss somethin' and mess something up, thus delaying things further. 😣

 

If I look into submitting these all to an acceptance agent, they handle everything then and there (including the acceptance and processing of my now late return)? My wife *doesn't have to be present to do so? 

 

Thanks again in advance.

Edited June 12, 2023 by TaskenLander

[prohias 3]

4 minutes ago, TaskenLander said:

 

Thank you for your feedback. I'm sorry; I misspoke (my wife and I were sure to leave her social blank on the W-7 form), just my 1040 Federal & State tax return has all 9's in the spot for her social. Does that matter greatly? Wouldn't they be able to see that we don't have a social for her at time of mail filing along with a W-7 application?  I suppose it wouldn't be the *worst thing to have to start over and print by hand but I'm wary I'll miss somethin' and mess something up, thus delaying things further. 😣

 

If I look into submitting these all to an acceptance agent, they handle everything then and there (including the acceptance and processing of my now late return)? My wife *doesn't have to be present to do so? 

 

Thanks again in advance.

I'm not an expert, this is just my experience and also what I know from many hours of research.

In terms of the agent, they handle the W-7 *and* the tax return, and submit them together. The issue is that they need both signatures on the return. If you are not physically together, I assume you'll need to mail her the signature page, have her sign it, and then have her mail it back to you.

 

The agent of course would be able to answer more questions about this. If you can afford a few hundred dollars, I strongly recommend going through H&R Block or another certified acceptance agent. Just my opinion.

[TaskenLander 13]

She has to sign the tax return, too?? Why did I not think of this / know this earlier when i had her mail me the W-7 form?? 😭😤

 

We officially just made it to the NVC step. Would all this tax stuff GREATLY delay our process of advancing? I haven't even began to proceed with the NVC email welcoming directions as I've been dealing this getting all this tax garbage sorted out. Can I just say "F it" and file 'single' just to get things processed and moving and amend later? Or file 'married separately'? I wouldn't need her signature then, would I? Just sucks as I owe $900 filing 'single' or 'married separately' and we stand to conceivably get that much *back IF I can successfully file 'married jointly'. 

 

Thank you again for your advice and shared experiences.

[TaskenLander 13]

 

28 minutes ago, prohias said:

I'm not an expert, this is just my experience and also what I know from many hours of research.

In terms of the agent, they handle the W-7 *and* the tax return, and submit them together. The issue is that they need both signatures on the return. If you are not physically together, I assume you'll need to mail her the signature page, have her sign it, and then have her mail it back to you.

 

The agent of course would be able to answer more questions about this. If you can afford a few hundred dollars, I strongly recommend going through H&R Block or another certified acceptance agent. Just my opinion.

 

EDIT: Would a scanned (digital) copy of her signature do? When they, the NVC, say they need my most recent tax return (would last year's, 2021) suffice? I have this year's W-2; just need to get my tax '23 stuff sorted out but don't want to risk delaying the next steps of our visa / NVC process. Thank you again.

Edited June 13, 2023 by TaskenLander

[TaskenLander 13]

38 minutes ago, prohias said:

I'm not an expert, this is just my experience and also what I know from many hours of research.

In terms of the agent, they handle the W-7 *and* the tax return, and submit them together. The issue is that they need both signatures on the return. If you are not physically together, I assume you'll need to mail her the signature page, have her sign it, and then have her mail it back to you.

 

The agent of course would be able to answer more questions about this. If you can afford a few hundred dollars, I strongly recommend going through H&R Block or another certified acceptance agent. Just my opinion.

2ND EDIT: And sorry for my perhaps childish tone two replies ago; this is all just so stressing and confusing to all sort out. I definitely appreciate your feedback! 

[Ontarkie 14,220]

~~Hijack posts and 10 other related posts split off to their own threads. Please do not post questions about your own case in other member's threads. Your post took over that member's thread.~~

[Troy B 223]

I too used H&R Block,  did my taxes in person on March 9th when my wife was visiting me in California.   Then waited for the paper filing to process.  The state refund landed in my account on May 11th.  Also the ITIN number was received on May 14.  The federal refund didn't land in my banking account until Aug 17th.

[TaskenLander 13]

1 hour ago, Ontarkie said:

~~Hijack posts and 10 other related posts split off to their own threads. Please do not post questions about your own case in other member's threads. Your post took over that member's thread.~~

I apologize, was not my intent. I took 'merged thread' to mean multiple similar questions could be also posted. Thank you for redirecting me. 

[TaskenLander 13]

1 hour ago, Troy B said:

I too used H&R Block,  did my taxes in person on March 9th when my wife was visiting me in California.   Then waited for the paper filing to process.  The state refund landed in my account on May 11th.  Also the ITIN number was received on May 14.  The federal refund didn't land in my banking account until Aug 17th.

Good to know! Would I be eligible to do this if my wife was not here in the U.S. at the time though? Thank you.