An IRS check may await you

Alicia Robinson

The Internal Revenue Service owes taxpayers in Newport Beach and

Costa Mesa almost $178,000 and wants to give it back.

The money is in the form of 190 undelivered checks for 2003 income

tax refunds or advance child tax credits, IRS spokesman Raphael

Tulino said. When refund checks don’t reach taxpayers, it’s often

because of a wrong address, he said.

The IRS uses an address matching system with the U.S. Postal

Service, but when taxpayers get married or divorced or fill out their

tax forms with a different name than they’ve given the post office,

an address change may not be picked up by the IRS, Tulino said.

To find out if they are owed money, people can visit

https://www.irs.gov or call (800) 829-1040. People who are owed child

tax credit checks should update their addresses by Dec. 5 or they

will have to wait until they file their taxes in 2004 to claim the

credit, Tulino said.

The IRS ends up with undelivered tax refund checks every year --

Tulino said three out of four taxpayers get some money refunded --

but the advance child tax credit checks are only being issued this

year because of a change in the amount of the child tax credit.

Tulino said the credit was increased from $600 to $1,000 per child

earlier this year and the difference was returned to taxpayers this

summer so they would have the money to spend, thus stimulating the

economy.

To get a tax refund faster and avoid address confusion, Tulino

said, direct deposit of tax refunds is available and is being widely

used. Of the 100 million refund checks issued this year, about 46

million were directly deposited in taxpayers’ accounts, he said.