Adventures with the IRS

Back in 2010 Sheryl’s beloved mother Millie passed away and she thoughtfully left us some stock.  As we understood the IRS rules we did not owe tax on what we inherited so when we received the stock we sold it as we would just as soon have the cash. It wasn’t a great deal of money, maybe enough to by a car… well maybe a crummy little Korean car.

Then last year we received a bill from the IRS that nope, we owed several thousand dollars from the sale of this stock! Ouch!  I called our tax guy in Klamath and sent him all our papers and he correctly deduced that what had happened was between the day Millie passed and the day we had actually sold the stock it had increased in value several hundred dollars and we only owed tax on that increase and what we now actually owed the IRS was $100.00 Fine, Ok, Got it.  I sent the IRS a check for $100 (and the tax guy in Klamath a check for $275 for his fees).  Done!   Wanna bet?

Three months later I get our check back and am notified by the IRS that oops I sent the check to their office in California and it is the wrong office.   So I called the number, listened intently to the options, pushed  7, held for 10 minutes, then pushed 3 then 7 again, then a magic number, and a code, and held a few more minutes and the nice man told me to send the check to an address in Utah. I did.  Over?  Wanna bet?

Last month in the mail I get another letter from the IRS – AND I AM NOT MAKING THIS UP – and a bill for $5.00 as we owe this as interest because it took so long for them to receive that $100.00…and…no address to send it to! AND IT INCLUDED FORMS TO FILL OUT SO I COULD HAVE INSTALLMENT PAYMENTS WITHDRAWN AUTOMATICALLY FROM MY BANK EACH MONTH!  For 5 bucks!

Call the 800 number, push 5, the security code, the personal identification question, wait while we transfer the call, listen to bad crackling music and finally get a guy with such a strong accent and high faluten’ attitude that I finally gave up as he said there was an IRS office in Oregon but I couldn’t possibly understand where.  Five bucks!

On the internet I found an IRS office in Salem about 40 miles away and drove there with my crisp five dollar bill in hand.  It looked like the DMV. Take a number. Sit with the defeated, despondent and possibly deranged IRS sitters. Finally my number comes up and no they cannot take my five dollars cash unless I see a special agent. OHMyGod.  Thankfully I had my check book and indeed they took my check!  Wanna make another bet?

This week in the mail Sheryl and I both received individual letters from the IRS that say actually we do not owe $5.00 (that we have already paid) it is only $4.89 and because it’s such a low amount we are forgiven and our balance is now zero!  Wanna bet?
UPDATE: March 6, 2013
Today in the mail we received a refund check from the IRS for $5.00.