Hi guys, I've been trying to file my taxes online here in good old Georgia, Have hit one major problem and was wondering if any of you good tax paying people have experienced the same.
I'm here on an H1B visa accompanied by wife on an H4, to claim as a married person I need to enter my wifes social security number. She as you know is not allowed such a number, any suggestions as to how I can get round this problem.
Thanks,..... Dave
She should be able to get a TIN -Tax Identification Number for just this purpose.
Yeah, you have to apply for an ITIN (Individual Taxpayer Identification Number) number. Get in touch with your local tax office and get the forms. fill them in, copy your visas and passports and send it all off. Can take anything from 4 weeks to 4 months to come through so you may need to have an extension for your taxes. As long as you don't owe any money then you are fine. If you think you do, pay what you owe so you don't get charged horrendous interest rates.
You may actually get all the details that you need online if you do a search for ITIN numbers. )
We didn't know about this either the first time we did our taxes. )
Talk about posting at the same time grin
Talk about posting at the same time :grin:
Do I have to? It'd make for a very dull conversation....
Err, could I ask why she isn't allowed a number. I wasn't allowed to work for 5 years when I came here but was issued a SS card with huge red letters stamped across it saying 'not valid for employment.'
I didn't know why I was denied work but his nibs was on an H1B and they insisted I have a card too. Useless as it was.
We tried to get the missus a social security number when we first arrived but the office said she wasn't allowed one. When we had to take our driving tests we had to have a letter from the social security office explaining why she didnt have a number.
Curiouser and curiouser.
The laws changed with the issuing of SS numbers for non-working purposes. they gave ITIN numbers instead, on a different type of card, so there is no confusion. we had friends who moved to Atlanta and she was issued the same type of thing you were, Annie, but a year after they came back we moved out and the rules had changed )
what she says.
DL, these days you're lucky to live in a state where they will issue licences without real SS numbers.
.....But remember, your driving licence is not (no-way no-how) being used as an identity card. Never. This is a democracy, you know. Free-est country in the world.
We had the same thing, sat down to do the taxes the first time (scary) and thought whoops.....daughter and myself had no SS numbers and so had to get online quick and find out what to do. We sent off for the ITIN numbers and filed for an extension at the same time.
One word of warning....when your wife eventually does get her SS# you will have to send all the pertinant info off to the IRS to change the ITIN# to the SS#. This does NOT get done automatically and you CANT just put the SS# onto the form when filing taxes without letting the IRS know first.....voice of experience talking here )
Myself and daughter were not allowed SS# over here until we got our Greencards, the SS office didnt actually give a good explanation of why not as it couldnt really have been tied to the 'no working' thing because daughter was only 3 years old at the time.
I was however able to get a drivers license as easy as anything, and here in Ohio (even though they dont actually tell you about it) you can choose to not put your SS# on your drivers license at all.
Mandy
One word of warning....when your wife eventually does get her SS# you will have to send all the pertinant info off to the IRS to change the ITIN# to the SS#. This does NOT get done automatically and you CANT just put the SS# onto the form when filing taxes without letting the IRS know first.....voice of experience talking here :)
We did not do this and had no problems (yet) -we just put the SS#s on the next year's tax form. We did have to give the TINs when we applied for SS#s though, I think.
We did that, we just put the new SS# instead of the ITIN when filing. We e-filed and when I went to check on the status of the e-filing I was told it had been rejected because of conflicting ITIN/SS#'s.
Like dim-wits, we too thought that it would have gone through automatically, but no......luckily all it took was sending our ITIN and our new SS numbers to the department specified and then it went through auto matically. This was a load of tosh though because when we e-filed I did sent that exact same info in with our filing of the bit where you are allowed to write extra notes.
Mandy
Perhaps it was just an efiling issue -we file by mail. ???