since I was up till 2 am downloading those videos. But I got them all, yay!
Today was a pretty productive day despite feeling like an old woman when I first got up. Considering it was practically balmy for January, I hate to think what I'll feel like later in the week when the temperatures turn colder. I wasn't exactly sure I was going to make it up the hill to the hospital I work in after the bus driver let me off. Every joint and my feet were not just aching, not just throbbing, but flared up to acute stabbing pain. I was walking like, well, almost like a crab. It was awful. I'm used to a lot of chronic pain, but this was actually getting to me. On the other hand, I took a couple of ibuprofen and it eventually got better, especially as I moved around, and I didn't have to repeat the dose later. So that was good.
But the best thing of all about today was the news I got from the IRS. I've been trying to call them since Friday with absolutely no luck. The main phone number would make you go through the menu, put you on hold, and once you'd been on hold for as long as they told you, it would suddenly tell you the call could not be completed at this time and hang up. So last night I went poking through some important papers and came up with the actual agreement I made with the IRS as far as paying them in instalments. It had another number which took longer to get through in terms of hold time, but led to a real person. I thought I still owed a small amount of money, but was concerned that they would take out $200 anyway because it might have been set up for a certain amount of time, and I accidentally double-paid them in June, when the automatic debits began. That would have been bad because I get paid the day after it normally comes out and wouldn't have the money to cover it. She looked up my record and not only will that not happen, I have a CREDIT with them, so they owe me. That's a wonderful thing. Plus, we usually get our W-2s with our first paycheque of the year (in this case Thursday), and I'm going to file as soon as possible because I think I'm going to get a refund for the first time in six years. Remember that $600 people got from George W Bush' government? Never saw it; it went straight to my tax bill. So, anyway, I'm excited. So now I don't owe any taxes to the federal or state governments. Yay!
Born, like other comic book characters, out of an otherwise trivial but life-changing animal bite, the Rabid Librarian seeks out strange, useless facts, raves about real and perceived injustices, and seeks to meet her greatest challenge of all--her own life.
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Showing posts with label IRS. Show all posts
Showing posts with label IRS. Show all posts
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
Friday, July 29, 2011
I got an annual statement from the IRS
today, detailing my payments through May. I've made three since then (including the infamous double payment in June). The upshot is that I'm more than halfway to paying them off, and my last payment should be December (or at least if there is one in January, it will be a few dollars for interest). This is rather heartening, as it has been a hardship. This year I paid my taxes on time, and next year I may actually get a refund, as I will (hopefully) have only one job to deal with this year and everything should be paid off by then. So, the end is in sight. Hurrah. Of course, after that, I need to start paying on my student loans which are currently in forbearance since there was no way I could do both. So I'm not sure there is a car fund in my future, but maybe if I could put a little from each paycheque in, it might take awhile, but it would get there. Still, I may not be able to start until the beginning of the year (see below for why).
The end is in sight for physical therapy, as well. It looks like I need to go maybe two more weeks. The pain's been gone for awhile and I can actually feel my fingers again. I've checked with the optometrist to see how much my contacts will be, but they couldn't find my file earlier, so I'll have to check back tomorrow. I'd like to get them before my flexible spending account goes empty, but still have enough to fund the PT sessions. I think my vision plan will pay most of it. I only have about $350 left, so it will drain quickly, plus I have two specialist appointments and my regular doctor next month. The specialists and the PT sessions are $40 a pop. That's $300 by the end of August. Then there's my medicine and diabetic supplies, which runs about $275 a month after insurance, and that I'll have to pay out of pocket, so things are going to be very tight for the rest of the year. Some are more vital than others; I'm tempted to go off my medicine for the triglycerides and ADD. That would be $100 in savings right there. But I'll try to keep them. It's a shame when you have insurance--decent insurance, mind you, that pays for a lot others won't, but you still are trying to decide what you can get to keep you healthy.
The end is in sight for physical therapy, as well. It looks like I need to go maybe two more weeks. The pain's been gone for awhile and I can actually feel my fingers again. I've checked with the optometrist to see how much my contacts will be, but they couldn't find my file earlier, so I'll have to check back tomorrow. I'd like to get them before my flexible spending account goes empty, but still have enough to fund the PT sessions. I think my vision plan will pay most of it. I only have about $350 left, so it will drain quickly, plus I have two specialist appointments and my regular doctor next month. The specialists and the PT sessions are $40 a pop. That's $300 by the end of August. Then there's my medicine and diabetic supplies, which runs about $275 a month after insurance, and that I'll have to pay out of pocket, so things are going to be very tight for the rest of the year. Some are more vital than others; I'm tempted to go off my medicine for the triglycerides and ADD. That would be $100 in savings right there. But I'll try to keep them. It's a shame when you have insurance--decent insurance, mind you, that pays for a lot others won't, but you still are trying to decide what you can get to keep you healthy.
Thursday, June 30, 2011
This has been a very taxing week (I really did not mean to make a pun)
As I believe I've written before, I have a payment plan with the IRS to pay off my taxes. Back in March I set up the agreement and then signed paperwork to have the amount automatically taken from my bank account each month. But there was a catch--it would take awhile before that would happen, so I had to make payments in the interim either by cheque or through an online third party by the 25th of each month. They were supposed to let me know when the first payment would come out. I think you can see where I'm going with this. The last I heard from them was in May, a duplicate set of letters saying it was taking a little longer to review my account, and that was it. So I've been checking each 25th of the month to see if anything has come out of my account, then going through an third party payer and paying the amount that night, so it's still on time.
I did this on Saturday. Apparently on Monday, the money came out automatically, sending my account into quite the negative. Since the online payer took out the amount owed and a second debit of their fee, and then the IRS took out the amount owed in two instalments as well, there were four insufficient fund fees (even though there was enough money for what I paid on Saturday).
I've talked to the IRS, the third party payer, and the bank. The IRS says it sent a letter telling me when it would start. I suspect I was supposed to get two different letters back in May and somehow a duplicate letter was sent instead. I have no way of proving that, of course. They will still require a payment next month; the double payment just lessens the timeframe of the payments. They suggested talking to the payer. The payer said that it would take 6-8 weeks to investigate things, that it would ultimately depend on the IRS, and since I still have some time to pay on the money I owe, it would be ultimately denied. The bank was sympathetic, but because there was no bank error they 'split it with me', taking off two of the charges.
The upshot of this is I cannot pay my rent on time this month. I am going to talk to the leasing manager tomorrow. Normally this is how things unfold: You have until the 5th to pay the rent. On the 6th, there is a $50 charge and normally you get a seven-day notice to ante up or they'll file for eviction. Sometimes they don't send the notice out for a day or two. Then you have seven days, with each additional day after the 6th costing $5 more. If I get the notice on the 6th, I have until the 13th. I get paid on the 14th, but could pay first thing that morning (late payments must be made by money order). So it will be a close thing, which is why I'm going to discuss it with them first. It also means I have to pay $90 in late fees. If they file in court, I think (if I recall from some of my less fortunate financial times), it's $100 on top of that for court costs, but you get to stay.
:(
So that's where I stand on that. I can get my bus pass, pay my phone bill, and eat for the next two weeks, but not pay my rent. I have checked and I think I will be able to pay my other bills (including the IRS) even with the additional charges when I get paid on the 14th.
Boy this is a pain. The sad thing is that it's really no one's fault (well, the IRS maybe a bit, for sending me the wrong notice), and if it hadn't been for the fact that it was on a weekend, the money would have come out and I would have known not to pay any more.
I will say that when I found this all out (before talking to the various agencies), I called YKWIA, who is oddly comforting at times even though he generally is not. In this case he was, I suspect because he realised through my disjointed blubberings that it was not, in fact, my fault for a change and that I'd been screwed over by karma or whatever whilst trying to be responsible.
I called him whilst waiting for the bus, then got into work a total mess. I'd obviously been crying. I hadn't eaten yet, so I stopped by the cafeteria and my satchel fell off my arm, scattering the salad I was making all over the bar. I did not lose my cool, but it was a close call. Then I went back to my office, stopped by the bathroom to wash my face, ate my salad, and hid in my cubicle doing what work I could do to take my mind off of things and letting my face return to normal rather than the reddened mass that weeping had created. It took a good two hours to truly calm down, and then I got caught up in teaching someone who is my backup what to do, and so I didn't call the others until the next day.
On Tuesday I also found out the results of my MRI. I have three bulging discs and a congenital stenosis (narrowing of the spinal canal) made worse through bone growths called osteophytes. The combination means the nerves are being compressed, causing my arm and shoulder to hurt and my lower arm to go numb. The good news is that it is not severe enough to require surgery, although they are going to send me to a neck surgeon to oversee my care (the doctor I'd seen was a hand/upper extremity specialist). Since I can't see the neck specialist until mid-July, they want me to start physical therapy for relief from the pain and numbness. I start tomorrow morning at 7:30 am. Yeah. That early. And when I made the appointment I told them early because I didn't want to miss work, and totally forgot that I'm off tomorrow. :)
Another theme that has been continuing throughout the week is trying to fix a computer where Internet Explorer opens and then shuts down immediately. The first day I tried several things, had no luck, mainly because most of Microsoft's solutions required a working browser, and got home late and went on to bed without blogging. Tuesday, the day of horribleness, I got over there only to find that the disk I'd made with Firefox on it was not in my satchel. I got home late that night as well. Yesterday I managed to take the disk with me, but even trying the other things and updating to IE 9, there was no luck fixing IE, but Firefox works. Last night we discovered that .mth files weren't opening in Firefox so I went over again and within a few minutes had the problem solved by downloading an add-on for that. I still haven't given up on the IE issue, as the person is used to that browser, but for now online browsing is a go, favourites have been imported to bookmarks, and saved files will open. I actually got home by dusk tonight, called to make sure he knew I was home, and took his suggestion to kick back and watch 'Bones' and relax for a bit. If anyone has suggestions for what to do about fixing Internet Explorer, I'm all ears. But for now, I'm not going to think about it. I'm home at a reasonable hour for the first time in days, when I didn't just fall into bed. And I have four days off! Here's to getting some things done, and getting some rest, and knowing that things will eventually get better. It'll be rough for the next month or so, and then hopefully improve. Wish me luck!
I did this on Saturday. Apparently on Monday, the money came out automatically, sending my account into quite the negative. Since the online payer took out the amount owed and a second debit of their fee, and then the IRS took out the amount owed in two instalments as well, there were four insufficient fund fees (even though there was enough money for what I paid on Saturday).
I've talked to the IRS, the third party payer, and the bank. The IRS says it sent a letter telling me when it would start. I suspect I was supposed to get two different letters back in May and somehow a duplicate letter was sent instead. I have no way of proving that, of course. They will still require a payment next month; the double payment just lessens the timeframe of the payments. They suggested talking to the payer. The payer said that it would take 6-8 weeks to investigate things, that it would ultimately depend on the IRS, and since I still have some time to pay on the money I owe, it would be ultimately denied. The bank was sympathetic, but because there was no bank error they 'split it with me', taking off two of the charges.
The upshot of this is I cannot pay my rent on time this month. I am going to talk to the leasing manager tomorrow. Normally this is how things unfold: You have until the 5th to pay the rent. On the 6th, there is a $50 charge and normally you get a seven-day notice to ante up or they'll file for eviction. Sometimes they don't send the notice out for a day or two. Then you have seven days, with each additional day after the 6th costing $5 more. If I get the notice on the 6th, I have until the 13th. I get paid on the 14th, but could pay first thing that morning (late payments must be made by money order). So it will be a close thing, which is why I'm going to discuss it with them first. It also means I have to pay $90 in late fees. If they file in court, I think (if I recall from some of my less fortunate financial times), it's $100 on top of that for court costs, but you get to stay.
:(
So that's where I stand on that. I can get my bus pass, pay my phone bill, and eat for the next two weeks, but not pay my rent. I have checked and I think I will be able to pay my other bills (including the IRS) even with the additional charges when I get paid on the 14th.
Boy this is a pain. The sad thing is that it's really no one's fault (well, the IRS maybe a bit, for sending me the wrong notice), and if it hadn't been for the fact that it was on a weekend, the money would have come out and I would have known not to pay any more.
I will say that when I found this all out (before talking to the various agencies), I called YKWIA, who is oddly comforting at times even though he generally is not. In this case he was, I suspect because he realised through my disjointed blubberings that it was not, in fact, my fault for a change and that I'd been screwed over by karma or whatever whilst trying to be responsible.
I called him whilst waiting for the bus, then got into work a total mess. I'd obviously been crying. I hadn't eaten yet, so I stopped by the cafeteria and my satchel fell off my arm, scattering the salad I was making all over the bar. I did not lose my cool, but it was a close call. Then I went back to my office, stopped by the bathroom to wash my face, ate my salad, and hid in my cubicle doing what work I could do to take my mind off of things and letting my face return to normal rather than the reddened mass that weeping had created. It took a good two hours to truly calm down, and then I got caught up in teaching someone who is my backup what to do, and so I didn't call the others until the next day.
On Tuesday I also found out the results of my MRI. I have three bulging discs and a congenital stenosis (narrowing of the spinal canal) made worse through bone growths called osteophytes. The combination means the nerves are being compressed, causing my arm and shoulder to hurt and my lower arm to go numb. The good news is that it is not severe enough to require surgery, although they are going to send me to a neck surgeon to oversee my care (the doctor I'd seen was a hand/upper extremity specialist). Since I can't see the neck specialist until mid-July, they want me to start physical therapy for relief from the pain and numbness. I start tomorrow morning at 7:30 am. Yeah. That early. And when I made the appointment I told them early because I didn't want to miss work, and totally forgot that I'm off tomorrow. :)
Another theme that has been continuing throughout the week is trying to fix a computer where Internet Explorer opens and then shuts down immediately. The first day I tried several things, had no luck, mainly because most of Microsoft's solutions required a working browser, and got home late and went on to bed without blogging. Tuesday, the day of horribleness, I got over there only to find that the disk I'd made with Firefox on it was not in my satchel. I got home late that night as well. Yesterday I managed to take the disk with me, but even trying the other things and updating to IE 9, there was no luck fixing IE, but Firefox works. Last night we discovered that .mth files weren't opening in Firefox so I went over again and within a few minutes had the problem solved by downloading an add-on for that. I still haven't given up on the IE issue, as the person is used to that browser, but for now online browsing is a go, favourites have been imported to bookmarks, and saved files will open. I actually got home by dusk tonight, called to make sure he knew I was home, and took his suggestion to kick back and watch 'Bones' and relax for a bit. If anyone has suggestions for what to do about fixing Internet Explorer, I'm all ears. But for now, I'm not going to think about it. I'm home at a reasonable hour for the first time in days, when I didn't just fall into bed. And I have four days off! Here's to getting some things done, and getting some rest, and knowing that things will eventually get better. It'll be rough for the next month or so, and then hopefully improve. Wish me luck!
Labels:
Finances,
Internet Browsers,
IRS,
MRI,
Neck,
Physical Therapy,
Taxes
Thursday, May 05, 2011
Murphy's Law of Tech Support
states that no matter what the computer issue, it will resolve itself when faced with a technician so the user cannot demonstrate the problem. [Okay, maybe it's someone else's law, but that's what I've always said, anyway.]
I was supposed to fix a computer tonight. It worked perfectly when I got there. We decided to leave it alone rather than try to figure out what happened. But I got a lovely meal out of it--a tasty lentil dish, wonderful salad, and an unusual but delightful soup. I really need to learn to cook. I have about as many cookbooks as YKWIA, but I don't cook, and that's a shame. He's offered to teach me; it's just a matter of finding time.
Oh, I'm tired tonight. But I got home ahead of the rain, and it isn't quite midnight. I dropped off my rent on the way home. So I'm good on that, and it's on time. Tomorrow I need to go over there early and sign my new lease.
I got a letter from the IRS which totally doesn't make sense. I expected something saying that my payments would begin to be automatically debited (that was the idea, anyway). Instead they say that they're delaying correspondence to investigate the situation, that no action is required on my part other than continue sending in payments, etc. It sounded like a 'sorry, we're dealing with red tape and can't possibly get to you any time soon', while indicating that I should contact them if I haven't heard anything in 45 days. Weird. I guess I'll just keep paying the way I have been.
I was supposed to fix a computer tonight. It worked perfectly when I got there. We decided to leave it alone rather than try to figure out what happened. But I got a lovely meal out of it--a tasty lentil dish, wonderful salad, and an unusual but delightful soup. I really need to learn to cook. I have about as many cookbooks as YKWIA, but I don't cook, and that's a shame. He's offered to teach me; it's just a matter of finding time.
Oh, I'm tired tonight. But I got home ahead of the rain, and it isn't quite midnight. I dropped off my rent on the way home. So I'm good on that, and it's on time. Tomorrow I need to go over there early and sign my new lease.
I got a letter from the IRS which totally doesn't make sense. I expected something saying that my payments would begin to be automatically debited (that was the idea, anyway). Instead they say that they're delaying correspondence to investigate the situation, that no action is required on my part other than continue sending in payments, etc. It sounded like a 'sorry, we're dealing with red tape and can't possibly get to you any time soon', while indicating that I should contact them if I haven't heard anything in 45 days. Weird. I guess I'll just keep paying the way I have been.
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
7 minutes/$666/$313/free
- 7 minutes (How much I beat the midnight deadline in e-filing my taxes. Okay, yes, I put it off, but I've been sick this week, too. I didn't mean to put it off till quite so late!)
- $666 (How much I owe the federal government for this year...yes, $666. Aren't you glad I'm not a religious wingnut?)
- $313 (How much I owe the Kentucky state government for this year.)
- Free (How much it cost to do my taxes via TurboTax, through an alliance Kentucky participates in for lower income filers [You have to go in through the state's Revenue Cabinet E-File web page.])
Having it all over (except the paying, of course)....Priceless.
It's a shame when you make less than $25,000 and you owe about $1000 back in taxes that weren't withheld. I did change my W-4s at the second job partway through the year but I'm not sure how much it really helped. Before I put in the gas station W-2, I had a refund of $424 coming to me, so apparently too much is withheld at the hospital and too little at the gas station. Sigh.
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