Are you still waiting for your income tax refund? It is that time of year when the fortunate among us are expecting refunds from the government. However, this anticipation can quickly turn to worry when the money you are expecting does not arrive.
Federal refunds this year may be taking more time to arrive than expected. Last month, the National Taxpayer Advocate confirmed that the IRS is holding 29 million tax returns for manual processing. This is on top of the unprocessed paper returns for 2019 that have been delayed due to staff shortages caused by Covid-19. However, it could be your return itself that is causing the delay. E-Filing your return is the fastest way to submit your Tax Return to the IRS and provides the quickest return of your refund if there is no reason for the return to be reviewed. If you mailed your Tax Return it will take longer for your refund to arrive. Another cause for a delay in processing a return is if it requires further review. This could occur if your tax return is incomplete, has an error, or you filed for the Earned Income Tax Credit or Additional Child Tax Credit. If the return includes the injured spouse allocation or you have been affected by identity fraud, you will almost certainly experience a delay.
As of right now the IRS estimates 21 days for refunds to arrive if the tax return was e-filed and up to 6 weeks for refunds to arrive if the return was mailed.
In order to track the status of your tax refund you are going to need several things on hand. Make sure that you have your social security number or Individual Taxpayer Identification number, your filing status, and your refund amount in whole dollars. The next thing you want to do is travel to the IRS website at https://www.irs.gov/refunds to track the status of your refund. The IRS also provides a mobile app called IRS2GO that checks your tax refund status (available on IOS & Android Devices). Keep in mind that the IRS updates the data in its database overnight so changes to your status will not be instantaneous.
You can also check the status of your New Jersey refund online at:
NJ Division of Taxation – Check the Status of Your New Jersey Income Tax Refund (state.nj.us)
New Jersey suggests waiting 4 weeks after filing electronically and at least 12 weeks after filing a paper return before checking the status.
Article Submitted by – Chris Naples
