By Staff
There are nine Escambia County residents among 1,840 Alabama taxpayers who are due refund checks worth more than $2.1 million after those checks were returned as undeliverable.
The refund checks, averaging about $1,144 in Alabama, can be claimed as soon as taxpayers update their addresses with the IRS. Taxpayers in 66 Alabama counties have checks waiting.
Nationwide, the IRS is trying to connect more than 115,000 taxpayers with checks worth about $110 million. Some taxpayers have more than one check waiting.
The “Where's My Refund?” tool on IRS.gov enables taxpayers to check the status of their refunds. A taxpayer must submit his or her social security number, filing status and amount of refund shown on their 2006 return. The tool will provide the status of their refund and in some cases provide instructions on how to resolve delivery problems.
Taxpayers can access a telephone version of “Where's My Refund?” by calling 1-800-829-1954.
The number of undeliverable refunds each year is a relatively small portion of all refunds returned to taxpayers. So far in 2007, the IRS has processed nearly 105 million refunds, totaling about $240 billion, either by mail or direct deposit.
In fact, undeliverable refunds account for less than one-tenth of 1 percent of all refunds, or about one in a thousand.
A refund check is normally returned as undeliverable when a taxpayer moves without updating his or her address with either the U.S. Postal Service or the IRS.
Telephone Tax Refund
The national list of taxpayers due undeliverable refunds this year rose about 21 percent from 95,746 last year. The sharp increase is due in part to the Telephone Excise Tax Refund.