Oh, IRS....

So here's the latest adventure...

I'll start from the beginning. We closed on our house at the beginning of April. About a week later we had my then co-worker, Caleb, help us file our amended return so we could get our $8000. We had filed our taxes in early March originally, and we used TurboTax, so we just went on and used them to get our amended return. We filled it out with no problem, printed it, signed it, and mailed it in. Little did we know what would go on since then. We didn't worry about it much. I went online a couple weeks ago and it said to give 8-12 weeks for processing, so I figured it was just the IRS being slow. We have been praying it would arrive because I am in desperate need of a new eye exam as well as new contacts (some may have noticed I have been wearing my glasses exclusively for about a year now), as well as some maternity clothes as my belly expands, all of which we have been holding out on until the $8000 comes for one reason or another.

Then one day, my sister-in-law, Heather, posts on Facebook that she and my brother, Andy, received their $8000. This sent up red flags in my head because they moved at least a month after us and if I remember correctly, they didn't close on their house until late May/early June. That means that we had been waiting for three months for something that was apparently coming in at closer to three weeks for others. Needless to say, we were going to call the IRS and find out what happened. Keep in mind that a few weeks ago, when I had tried to investigate where our money was, I had tried calling the IRS, and the phone tree was so extensive and the wait was so long I gave up before speaking to a human. This ended up being a big mistake.

So yesterday David called the IRS. Easier said than done. After one number said to call another number and then maybe even another, we got to the crazy phone tree and waiting period. I think he was on hold somewhere between 15 and 20 minutes. Finally, a human. We found out that our amended return had made it to Fresno, but a mistake was found and they sent it back to us. We, however, never received it. My best guess is that the address was wrong or that the post office lost it or just failed to forward it since there was a high chance it was addressed to our Clearfield address (this address was on the return because it was on our original return, however the address to our house was also on the return...but I doubt anyone thought to use it). Whatever the case may be, it never reached us, and so we sat in complete ignorance of the situation. Apparently what the IRS does in a case like this, is they send the return back and wait. They don't track it or anything so they don't know if we get it or not, they just assume we will. They wait three months and if they don't hear from us, our return is deleted out of the system completely as if we never sent it in the first place. So we found all this out, as well as the fact that we were a mere four days late for this three month deadline. Had I stuck with the phones the first time several weeks prior, the whole thing might have been different. Oh well. So our first return was wiped clean. We got the jump drive out with our amended return on it, reprinted it, and typed a letter of explanation to the IRS, per our instructions. We then signed everything and took all the paperwork to the post office, where we mailed them priority with delivery confirmation to avoid them getting lost a second time. If the problem they found the first time (which was erased with our original return so we don't know what it was because we called those four days late) still exists, hopefully we will actually get it back this time. If all is well, our money should be direct deposited within the next few weeks.

Stay tuned for updates...