SOL March 1: Taxes

            I met with my H&R Block accountant to get my tax forms filled out and filed today. With multiple 401(k)s, IRAs, pensions (all from having worked at many jobs), as well as continuing some freelance work in my semiretirement, I’d rather have a professional go through my documents, ensure I fill out the right forms, and make sure I get all the deductions I’m entitled to. The man who’d been doing them has now retired himself, but the woman doing my taxes today was not a stranger.

           I’d met D.M. two years ago when I started getting letters from the IRS saying that I owed lots more money than I’d been led to believe on my 2019 return. Remember doing your taxes for 2019 that first year of Covid? It took a bit longer to get all my documents, and we all got automatic extensions. By the time I called H&R Block, J.D., my regular accountant, was no longer in the office. (Turned out he’d had Covid early on and wasn’t available that tax season.) I was assigned a new person, but we couldn’t meet in person (Covid). I left my documents at the office, then got some e-mails asking questions, which I tried to answer. Then I picked up what I needed to pay what I owed and my return was e-mailed. 

            It took two years for the IRS to discover something didn’t add up. I started getting letters in the summer of 2021 about that 2019 return, and J.D. doesn’t work outside of tax season. I e-mailed the person who’d done my 2019 return, but he never responded. So I stopped by the office and said I needed help. Eventually I got an appointment with D.M. She was great!

            It took several weeks and numerous meetings and even phone calls to the companies holding my retirement funds to discover exactly where the mistake had been made. At first it looked like the IRS had made the mistake. D.M. called the IRS, thought she’s straightened it out, but I continued to get harrying letters from the IRS. Finally, we figured out where the mistake actually happened — that substitute person in 2020 filling out my 2019 return saw two documents from the same company with identical amounts of income and just assumed they were duplicates, when they weren’t. Didn’t anyone ever tell him “never assume; it will make an “ass” out of “u” and “me.” An amended return was filed and everything was fixed.

            This year, when I called H&R Block to make my appointment I learned that J.D. was no longer there. But I am so glad I got assigned to D.M. She knows me, she’s organized, she explains everything. Now all I have to do with write a couple of check in mid-April, and my tax season will be over.

 

SOL March 10: Taxes

I took all my documents and numbers to my tax preparer yesterday and sat across the desk from him for more than an hour and a half. Some of the time was taken up by chit-chat — he had covid last year, but has recovered. The company had installed a plastic shield across his desk, with a slot for papers to be passed through, but my preparer took them from me from around the edge of the shield.

            While he entered numbers into my file, I played videogames on my phone: Sudoku, Solitaire. I wondered why I was there, then realized it was to answer questions — like why there was no 1099 from one company, but a 1099 from a company he’d never seen before (one replaced the other).

            It was also to be told that I was missing some numbers. How much was my first stimulus payment? Had I paid the long-term care insurance premium, and how much? How much did I pay in premiums for my medigap insurance? Had I paid any estimated tax last year?

            Once I got home, I had homework: to supply those missing numbers. Today, that is done. Next, I’ll learn how much I have to pay (because I didn’t pay estimated taxes last year; the tax preparer who’d done my taxes last year, when my usual guy was out sick with covid, hadn’t sent me any of the necessary forms). As Daniel Defoe wrote in 1726: “in this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.”

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I’m participating in the 14th annual Slice of Life Challenge over at Two Writing Teachers. This is day 10 of the 31-day challenge.  It’s not too late to make space for daily writing in a community that is encouraging, enthusiastic, and eager to read what you have to slice about.  Join in!