Hello everyone. My partner and I recently went through the Streamline service with one of the big tax preparers. To note, we have a relatively simple tax situation, zeroing out on all of the past 3 years tax returns that we needed to submit.
We sent out our Streamline pack in March. However, we recently received a letter from the IRS relating to our 2021 return (dated April 17, which we thought was a pretty quick turnaround from reception to processing the return). The letter states that my partner and I need to file individual 2555s rather than a single 2555 combining out foreign earned income. However, we find this strange because we did, in fact, submit separate 2555 forms. We’re not really sure what to do, as we believe this is an error on their part.
We’ve ed our tax preparer, and they are confused as well. They said they had never seen this sort of thing before. They are going to write them a letter, but I’m worried that without knowing the exact reason why they sent out this letter, we could potentially be caught in a loop of back and forth with the IRS.
What’s even more frustrating is the letter noted that we had 30 days to respond, yet we received the letter just after the 30 day limit. They don’t indicate that we owe anything, rather that we just need to rectify the situation, but again, how do we rectify an issue when there isn’t an issue?
Just to note, I have not phoned the IRS as of yet. That was going to be my last port of call. I did, however, sign into my IRS portal, but I see no indication that my 2021 return was even initially processed, as there is no transcript, nor is there any indication that a letter was sent out.
We just find the whole thing a little strange and arbitrary. And also, how did our 2021 paper return go thru the process of initial checks so quickly? We are wondering if it maybe has to do with the fact that 2021 is the last year of stimulus checks, so are they perhaps trying to finalise those as quickly as possible? Who knows.
Thanks for reading. This has caused us a little bit of panic, so any advice is appreciated.
We sent out our Streamline pack in March. However, we recently received a letter from the IRS relating to our 2021 return (dated April 17, which we thought was a pretty quick turnaround from reception to processing the return). The letter states that my partner and I need to file individual 2555s rather than a single 2555 combining out foreign earned income. However, we find this strange because we did, in fact, submit separate 2555 forms. We’re not really sure what to do, as we believe this is an error on their part.
We’ve ed our tax preparer, and they are confused as well. They said they had never seen this sort of thing before. They are going to write them a letter, but I’m worried that without knowing the exact reason why they sent out this letter, we could potentially be caught in a loop of back and forth with the IRS.
What’s even more frustrating is the letter noted that we had 30 days to respond, yet we received the letter just after the 30 day limit. They don’t indicate that we owe anything, rather that we just need to rectify the situation, but again, how do we rectify an issue when there isn’t an issue?
Just to note, I have not phoned the IRS as of yet. That was going to be my last port of call. I did, however, sign into my IRS portal, but I see no indication that my 2021 return was even initially processed, as there is no transcript, nor is there any indication that a letter was sent out.
We just find the whole thing a little strange and arbitrary. And also, how did our 2021 paper return go thru the process of initial checks so quickly? We are wondering if it maybe has to do with the fact that 2021 is the last year of stimulus checks, so are they perhaps trying to finalise those as quickly as possible? Who knows.
Thanks for reading. This has caused us a little bit of panic, so any advice is appreciated.
