It turns out that your information was already used to claim for someone else or the IRS rejected your claim for some other reason. Here is an outline of what to do if this happens.
What Happened
There are four possible reasons the IRS could have rejected your tax return:
- You’ve already e-filed or filed your return on another website or someone else. There’s nothing wrong with this. Sometimes we forget.
- Someone has filed a return on your behalf. This means that someone could have claimed you as a dependent on their return.
- Someone has filed a return and entered your social security number by mistake.
- Someone deliberately filed a return with your social security number. This is fraud.
What to do
No matter which situation applies to you, here are the steps you need to follow to figure out why your tax return was rejected. This will explain which one of these situations will apply to you.
The first thing you need to do is make sure that the social security number on your tax return is entered correctly. Numbers sometimes get mixed up. It’s a mistake everyone makes at one point or another. To check the social security number, you can go to the website where you filed and input your log in information. Go into your account and view your tax return information. Carefully review the number in the social security area. If you were rejected in a local office, you can request that they review your social security number with you.
If you notice an error, call the IRS. You can call the IRS at 1-800-829-1040 to report the error. From there, a few questions will be asked and they will be able to tell you how to proceed. You may want to print and mail your tax return to the IRS so they can update their records.
If you believe that someone has stolen your information, you need to contact the IRS Identity Protection Specialized Unit. They will be able to help you understand the processes you’ll need to go through in order to file your tax return and retrieve your identity. The number for the IRS Identity Protection Specialized Unit is 1-800-908-4490.
If your social security number was locked by the IRS, fraud may not necessarily be the culprit. This happens if the taxpayer received an error that connects them to a deceased taxpayer. If you did not ask for your social security to be locked, call the IRS to report the issue and find out how to continue. Once again, the number is 1-800-829-1040.
