Level-With-Me

Yes I'm aware of the form, I'm trying to e-file and doing the form manually does not allow for e-filing. My frustration comes into play where all these tax programs state they can help calculate for the months you're not married, but still isn't properly calculating my repayment owed for "overpaying" to the ACA. There are caps based on your level on the federal poverty line. My cap should be $1,000. But the programs aren't calculating that correctly and stating that I need to pay back $1,900.

He earned all his foreign income in Jersey, however since we're filing married jointly, all his income counts as joint income since when you file a joint as married, all your income even if it was earned in a different country counts as joint income since they look at you as a full year resident. I'm not sure why this is, but according to the IRS if you were here for one month or 11 months you're considered as a full year resident.

I'm going to try to explain this situation the best I can, please bear with me as I'm on very few hours of sleep - I'll be happy to clarify anything that doesn't make sense. I'm a W2 employee as well as 1099'd from a couple places as I work in Real Estate and also do home valuations for banks on the side. My taxes every year are already hard enough, but this year after I've gotten married has been a NIGHTMARE. My husband and I got married on 12/11/24 in order to stay within the legal timeframe that a K1 visa calls for - so RIGHT at the end of the year. Because it's recommended that I file married filing jointly, they view his income as both our income all year... but I digress. I do rely on ACA and have since it first came out in 2014. It's always been a struggle at tax time due to my 1099 income, not knowing how much I'm actually going to make that year. Sometimes, I do have to pay a penalty for exceeding my advance premium tax credit for making too much. This never really bothers me too much, as every time this happens, my refund from my W2 income just gets lessened and I've never had to really dig into my bank account to pay it back - yes I realize my refund is my money and I shouldn't look at it that way - however, after my write offs from 1099's, I'm usually looking at owing every year and 9 times out of 10, a good year for me is getting a couple hundred dollars back, or settling around $0 refund. Enter my husband and his income.... he moved here at the end of September last year, and received his last paycheck on the day he flew over. He comes from Jersey, which is a small island between the UK and France. Since I usually owe on taxes (which I pay out of my refund) I'm one of those who waits to the last minute to do my taxes because I never usually have a refund to look forward to... and the government shouldn't get my money any earlier than necessary. Big mistake this year. I never realized just how messed up the government views marriage when filing jointly for the first time, especially with a husband from across the world. In the beginning of April I requested that my husband get me a copy of his last paycheck which would show his YTD and his taxes paid for the 2024 year. Of course, our government wants to verify that he paid his taxes on his income... that he made in Jersey. I started with my tried and true H&R Block Deluxe, which I use every year. Everything was going smoothly until I got toward the end and after I input my info for ACA, my small refund turned into owing nearly 2K. My heart sank. After further research, and lots of googling and frantically turning to ChatGPT, I learned that my version of H&R Block doesn't allow you allocate your ACA payments - basically it's looking at our "combined" income and saying WOAH, you REALLY underestimated your income for this year, so now we have to charge you $1900 for your underpayment (Keep in mind, ACA repayments are capped by increments - more on that later). However, there is a form that allows you to "allocate" your payments which allows you to show that your combined income didn't start until the end of the year, and that they should only be looking at your income from January to November, and when it comes to December, that's when they can ding you a bit and charge you a little extra. Anyways, H&R Block DOES have this form, but it's only accessible when you open your forms an check a box saying you want to allocate and do manual calculations. When you try to click it, you get an error saying that you can't e-file when you do a manual override. This wasn't an option for me as I did not have time to do this manually (the manual calculations are a nightmare and I could never trust that I did the equation properly, and then submit it by mail and hope I did it right). I then moved on to FreeTaxUSA... this one claimed to support the ACA allocation - HOWEVER, when I got to the foreign tax credit (form 1116) I was told their software only supported foreign tax credit when the foreign income and taxes are reported on a K1, 1099-int, or form 1099-div. I had NO idea what this meant.. and I was running out of time.. so I moved on to Tax Slayer (all of this drama was between Friday night and last night). Tax Slayer was going great... not as user friendly as I would've liked... it definitely took me the longest to fill out.... so, by last night, I got to the ACA section. I input all the info, I did the prompts step by step as far as what I should be inputting according to heavy research/google/ChatGPT, I checked off that I needed and got to the end. Somehow this time around it was saying I owed nearly $1500. I opened my preliminary docs before finalizing and it was still showing my ACA repayment was $1900. According to my FPL of about 250%, my ACA repayment should be capped at $1000. According to ChatGPT (we became close friends recently), TaxSlayer's software did not calculate my ACA repayment properly based on my FPL %. And for those who are probably weary of ChatGPT, please know that did hours of due diligence on my own - including finding the federal chart directly from the government and verify that my FPL % was in fact capped at a repayment of $1,000. I called TaxSlayer support, and the first lady said "oh you need to calculate these numbers differently in these 3 boxes" so I thought - great, I'll change these numbers and it'll change the repayment amount. It didn't. I tried to call them back, was hung up on several times due to "high call volume" and the next lady I got was totally hands off and told me that she couldn't help me with calculations or readjust calculations that the software was getting wrong. So I cried a bit, and around 10PM last night did a last ditch effort over at TaxAct. ChatGPT did assure me that it did support the ACA allocation, however at 11:59PM when I was 98% done, I couldn't find anywhere to allocate... anywhere. It told me to search for form 8962 V, nothing. I was a blubbering mess. I was/am so tired. I missed the deadline, and now I'm going to probably be paying a huge late fee. My last hope is TurboTax. I'm almost afraid to ask because sometimes when you're having an issue this big, it feels like you're the only one who's facing said issue. But my hope is that someone lovely and kind here can assure me that spending $50+ on TurboTax deluxe WILL support both the 1116 form and the 8962 allocation. OR Maybe... someone has used one of the MANY programs I've tried to use and guide me in the right direction for these issues. I'm desperate! If you've made it this far...... thank you

UPDATE 8/14/24: I’m not sure if this is the best way to update as I’m not able to edit the original post, but for anyone who stumbles along this post in the future, here’s what’s happened: My fiancé was advised by an immigration lawyer to check off “NO” on the questionnaire regarding drugs - the questioning was along the lines of “have you ever used any illegal drugs” and according to the lawyer - the answer was no because he was prescribed this by a doctor. He then handed in his medical records showing his prescribed marijuana usage along with a note from said doctor stating he is no longer using this medication and that he fully believes that my fiancé can move forward without using it and that he’s never gotten any indication that my fiancé abused the medical marijuana. My fiancé then went to his medical in early April and the doctor seemed pretty good about it, but she said she wants him to have 3-4 random drug tests in the next 3 months to prove he’s no longer using. This prolonged our already long process, and because medical was in London, and he lives in Jersey, he had to then fly back and forth every time they called over the next 3 months - he had to book a ticket and fly there on 72 hour notice each time 😵‍💫 what a journey this truly has been! (For those wondering, Visa Medicals in London did give him the option to get drug tested in Jersey by any GP, but he called nearly every GP / Hospital on the island and nobody offered drug testing 🤦🏼‍♀️ in fact, they acted confused everywhere he inquired about it) He had 3 clean drug tests by the early July, and his interview was yesterday and it was very anticlimactic - all she said was “everything looks good, you’ll get a letter in a week or two”… didn’t tell him if he was approved or not.. but they kept his passport. So we are still very much on edge.. praying after all this time that something doesn’t crumble at the very end and he gets denied. 😔 Hopefully, all will be fine. But what everyone needs to know: be upfront about any medical marijuana usage / and STOP USING IT as soon as you start the k1 process! Get any supporting docs from your doctor and prove to them that you are not an addict. Luckily, it sounds like the US will soon lower the drug classification on marijuana, so lots could change. But until then, stop using and be truthful!

Hi, thanks for all your input, I appreciate everything! Yes - I’ve spent hours searching this forum and haven’t been able to find anything regarding medicinal use. My concern is that the London medical exam people are using doctors who must comply with the laws of the US and in the US, they still don’t recognize marijuana for medicinal purposes. Funnily enough, the thing you posted with the question to the lawyers was actually asked my me 😊 I did see their answers and they didn’t give me much hope.

Hi there, thanks so much for the helpful information. I saw that here on VJ there is actually an online chat available with immigration lawyers from JustAsk.com and I’m contemplating paying for the 1 week trial to get a few questions out there and then that way I can relay the transcript of our chat back to my fiancé to advise him on what NOT to do 🤦🏼‍♀️ I live in Michigan so I also reached out to a Detroit pro-bono immigration place and they gave me a ton of helpful resources. I definitely want to get over this hurdle, however it’s so scary knowing that he could walk into his medical and walk out with a denied visa. thank you again

Sorry for the late reply. This whole issue has caused tons of stress and turmoil between us and we’re essentially at a standstill on scheduling medical until we know exactly how to go about this. Regarding how he handles it when he’s here, he suffers 😕 last time he visited he was down for the count for 2 days straight with a migraine, sleeping/vomiting/repeat. At night he tosses and turns as he can’t get comfortable with his shoulder and it causes me to lose sleep as well (told him a while ago when he moves here we’ll need to sleep in separate bedrooms 🤭). At the end of the day, my thoughts are: The US doesn’t recognize marijuana as a medicinal, it’s still federally illegal regardless of how it’s used. His thoughts are: I’ll just explain the situation, I’ve read the laws and they decide based on “good moral character”, everything will be fine. My thoughts (rebuttal): Moral character didn’t matter for the MANY people here on VJ who have been denied for admitting using it only 1 time many years ago! You have no idea about the world of hurt we’re about to be in 😕

Correct. As I stated in the original post, he hasn’t used marijuana in the US while visiting and doesn’t intend to use once he arrives. Of course this wouldn’t be his choice however he’s now aware that his current regimen wouldn’t be legally allowable here in the United States. Perhaps (and I can only speculate) once he’s on my health insurance, maybe he can be prescribed something more realistic for the migraines that will work after one has already started. As far as the shoulder issue goes, he’ll probably need to grin and bear it with some Motrin or maybe some physical therapy down the road. I believe this issue comes down to the fact that he’s unfamiliar with the US laws as it’s technically considered “federally legal” in Jersey. I’ve made him aware of this issue and he proactively inquired and was told some information by a doctor that wasn’t true or reliable. I believe he had thought that since it’s prescribed by a medical doctor, it would make some sort of difference at the medical appointment by the Visa physician. I’m certainly not trying to make excuses, I don’t use marijuana and am not a fan of how it makes me feel. I’m just beside myself at this point thinking our journey will be terminated and I feel completely helpless.

Yeah, I am aware it’s federally outlawed which is why I’m not feeling too hopeful at this point 😔 I suppose my/our only hope is that if he’s able to pass a drug test, maybe this could be a saving grace? Obviously he’ll be upfront about using medicinally but perhaps stopping usage before the medical exam and producing a clean test could only help in this instance. He’s prescribed to it for physical pain issues. Old injury of a torn rotator cuff that never healed properly/still gives him issues when he tries to sleep at night, along with medically documented migraines that he hasn’t been able to get under control. He was prescribed a medication to take only before the migraine starts but he never gets any warning signs so it’s hard to use the medication as prescribed once symptoms start.

Hello, To preface this, I did a bit of research on these forums before deciding to post. I searched "marijuana" and "medical marijuana" but wasn't really finding anything that fit my current situation exactly. With that being said, if I'm posting this in the wrong area, or anyone has the need to tell me to review a specific post for my answer(s), please feel free to push me elsewhere. I feel like my situation is a bit unique as my fiancé lives on a small island off of the UK that is considered it's own democracy, however, the embassy he'll be interviewing at is London, which is about an hour long plane ride away. So let's just say the fact that he'll need to take two separate flights to do his medical, fly back, and re-book an entire flight for the interview itself is a headache, but I suppose these are the things we do for love 😊 To be clear: my fiancé has NOT scheduled his medical appointment yet, as we are still waiting for his police report to come back. He has not ever been cited or ticketed for marijuana (ie, recreational use). Jersey has allowed for medical marijuana. They don't have a special card to prove any type of "approval" as we have in the US, however, my fiancé has been prescribed *medical* marijuana for several years. About 6 months ago I began to research this and was panicking a bit. So, to ease my fears a bit, my fiancé reached out to the doctor who prescribes the medical marijuana (separate doctor as the GP) and he assured him that this information would NOT be on his medical report. Well, lo and behold, of course it's all over his medical report that he ordered from his GP, and just received on Friday. Now my panic has reached an all time high. I don't think I've slept more than 2 hours straight all weekend. I've read countless posts on here about people being immediately denied for marijuana use/having marijuana citations on their police report, etc. I would consider these as "recreational" use. But I can't find anything specific to medical marijuana. Obviously my brain is all over the place right now, but currently, my mindset is that since marijuana is still federally outlawed here in the US, should I automatically assume this is the end of the road for us? He has visited me MANY times during this K1 process and has never touched it while here in the US. He doesn't have any intentions of touching it when (well, if...) he moves here. From my research, the Visa Physician in London will be asking him about marijuana use, and obviously he can't lie, I wouldn't want him to do that - but will the fact that it's medically prescribed and monitored make ANY difference in this? I can only assume when he answers yes to this question, he'll be automatically sent for a drug screen, it will be positive, and then lights out... 😭 I feel physically ill and can't even fathom the last two years being a complete waste over THIS out of all the hurdles we've faced and all the money we've spent. If anyone can PLEASE shed some light on this from any past circumstances they've faced - specifically having to do with medicinal marijuana and NOT recreational - I'd appreciate any insight you could give me. I'm absolutely beside myself.

Hello everyone, If there is anyone who can guide me on this this next part of my journey - I'd be forever grateful!! My status has changed to "READY" for scheduling the interview but I want to do everything the right way. According to the travel.state.gov website, I have to now pay my fees, and it says exactly this on the website: The first thing you need to do after receiving your NVC Welcome Letter is pay your processing fees. There are two processing fees: -Immigrant Visa Application Processing Fee -Affidavit of Support Fee. You will need a bank routing number and a checking or savings account number from a U.S. based bank. To pay your fee, log into your case in CEAC and click the ‘PAY NOW’ button under Affidavit of Support Fee or IV Fee on your summary page. Here's where my issue comes into play...…. when I attempt to log into my case at CEAC, it asks me for a case number AND an invoice ID? I received one letter from NVC telling me that my case was being sent to the embassy. All it gave me was my new case number, and my old USCIS receipt number. I have no idea where to find the invoice ID? And without this invoice ID number, I can't figure out how to get in to my account and pay my fees. Any ideas?! Thank you!!!

Hi, so just want to clarify - we received notice that NVC sent our docs to the Embassy last month; so does this mean we need to do the DS160 before our interview can be scheduled? Ours is London... not sure if each embassy works the same!

I think it’s safe to say if you’ve had a previous K1 regardless of how long ago, extra steps will be taken to investigate how that panned out. I’m assuming the first one went through and you divorced? I have read on other forums that petitioners who had a divorce even when it was a US citizen on both sides have taken longer as they want to investigate the validity of the divorce and whatnot. Hoping you hear something soon!

Sorry for the confusion, I guess I’m not really sure as I am trying to figure out our next steps as well but from everything I’ve read I was under the impression that you can file for DS160 as soon as your file is sent out to the embassy.

So did you already submit your DS-160 and pay the visa fee? I am trying to plan ahead on mine for next steps but haven't been contacted by NVC yet