By Tom Herman
What ever happened to my missing federal income-tax refund
check?
If you've been wondering about this, a good place to start your
search is by visiting the Internal Revenue Service website (
irs.gov) and clicking on "Where's My Refund?"
The IRS says refunds generally are issued within 21 days after
the government receives your return.
There are many possible explanations for a missing refund check.
For example, the government may have mailed your check only to have
it returned as undeliverable because of an incorrect address.
In such cases, the IRS says it reissues checks once the taxpayer
provides a correct or updated address.
"You can easily avoid an undelivered refund by choosing direct
deposit," an IRS spokesman says. "Last year, more than three out of
four refund recipients chose direct deposit."
But the wait can be significantly longer if you are among the
millions of people who have filed an "amended" federal income-tax
return using Form 1040X. That's the form to use for fixing errors
and omissions in previously filed returns.
The IRS says it can take "up to three weeks" from the date you
mailed your amended return for it to arrive in its system. Amended
returns must be mailed. You still can't file them
electronically.
Then comes additional waiting time for the IRS to process your
amended return. The wheels of tax justice grind slowly.
"You can generally expect your amended return to be processed up
to 12 weeks from the date we receive it," the IRS says.
To find out the status of an amended return, try clicking on the
"Where's My Amended return" tool on the IRS site. That has the
status of amended returns for the current year and up to three
prior years, the IRS says.