[lostinwonderland]

I just found out earlier this week that I passed my last CPA exam and I was looking forward to a nice weekend of relaxation and fun with absolutely no studying. I finally decided to go ahead and file my tax return so that I could finally have fun tomorrow with friends at the beach. I efiled and later got a notification that my return was rejected. I login and it says that my SSN was already used to file a return. I find a way to dig into this information by creating an IRS account and requesting an income transcript. The person who did this only claimed the income I earned while I lived in Miami and they ending up getting a refund. BTW, a much bigger refund that what I should be getting!!! I left Miami back in Aug/Sept and started a new job in another location in October.

I’m totally freaking out and of course the IRS office is closed until Monday. Has this happened to anyone? I have excellent credit with no late payments or any negatives and now i’m worried what this criminal has been up to while I’ve had my head buried in the Gleim testbank.

This is not how my first free weekend was supposed to go! Its almost 3am and I’m too angry to even go to bed right now.

[C / X]

That's totally messed up, hopefully it doesn't mess up with your credit.

I've dealt with fraud and so has a friend and while we both got our money back ( for me…credit charges cancelled) they never caught either one of our fraudsters. I don't want to really give details on either case though, and you are dealing with a more serious issue: identity theft. I do find it ironic….but I shouldn't say what I feel.

You need to get a credit score report and find out if there is a way to access any other info the criminal got or is using against you. I don't know if you still get mail from your other address but it's probably time to do an inventory of anything that can really get you screwed (cc charges, etc).

FYI, I think they can still catch the person and even though there is only a million in one chance that they can get tipped off from this forum, be careful. The best place to strike those kind of ppl are when it they think are too smart to get caught. Most of the times it's only the stupid ones that get caught.

[livealittle]

you need to file a police report ASAP.

my aunt had her identity stolen and the very first thing you need to do is file a police report.

Then, contact your local IRS office. You will probably need to provide copies of the police report to any and everyone you do business with.

obvious, but change all your user names and passwords for any online activity you have. go see your bank and get their advice on next steps as well.

Someone obviously has your SSN and got hold of your W2 for one of your jobs, so they may have access to the database where your previous employer processed the W2's. Contact your previous employer as well.

BEC - 8/8/16
REG - 66, 77
AUD - 81
FAR - 9/8/16

[Anonymous]

Yes, contact the police now. Its pretty easy for them to catch the criminal if they used direct deposit or cashed the refund check. They should be able to expedite your concerns with the IRS so you don't have to sit on hold for 45 minutes like the average person.

There's a new phishing scam this year:
https://www.irs.gov/uac/newsroom/irs-alerts-payroll-and-hr-professionals-to-phishing-scheme-involving-w2s

There's a bunch of scams involving fraudulent tax returns so the criminals can get refunds. I think there's a specific department that handles fraud like this and they can help walk you through fixing everything and making sure you are protected going forward.

[ellejay]

This is a very big problem that is happening to lots of our clients at the tax office I work at. It's identity theft basically and they steal your return – make sure you change your password in the IRS database where you get your transcript. File a police report like others said and then contact the IRS on Monday. What we do for our clients is we draft a letter to the IRS telling them that the previous return was identity theft, then we include the paper filed return. This will delay your tax return of course, and I believe the IRS will provide you with a special pin number you will be required to use whenever you file a return in the future.

[GiniC]

This happened to my dad a few years ago. The IRS has protocols in place to deal with this, including issuing you a separate taxpayer ID number to protect future returns and refunds. Definitely contact the IRS as soon as possible (this time of year the help lines are actually manned more than 9-5, FYI). Local police probably have instructions for you as well. Unfortunately, this is not as uncommon an occurrence as we would like it to be.

[Anonymous]

That sucks. Make sure you file a report. Look at bank statements etc. So long as you report to CC companies etc promptly you are not out of pocket on anything. Got to do a mini-audit across your personal records.

[Author]

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