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Question

I have had money withheld by my previous employer for Oklahoma State income taxes for the years 2006, 2007, and 2008. I should not have been taxed by Oklahoma at all for 2006, 2007, or the first quarter of 2008. How can I EVER get my employer to file an ammended W2 on my behalf? I don't want to file a return with Oklahoma for that money as the return will then be taxed by the IRS, but it should not be taxed as it already showed as income in those years and was already taxed.

Of course, once the W2's are corrected for those time periods, I believe that it will be up to my employer to return that money directly to me and seek his money from Oklahoma. But that will be the next battle. First, how can I get him to comply? How can I get him to correct those previous W2's?

Submitted: 68 days and 1 hours ago.
Category: Tax
Value: $30
Status: CLOSED
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Optional Information

Country/State/Province of question: Oklahoma

Already Tried:
I started by filling out a reqest for W2 correction at a website used by my previous employer. That site is called "www.theworknumber.com". It states that they will respond to me within 30 days... it has been more than 6 months now.

I have since tried contacting: My previous employer (who will no longer respond to me), that would be PDS Technical Services, Inc. in Dallas Tx. Contacted a private attorney who directed me to Wa. Dept. of Labor and Industries (I live in Bothell Wa.) who directed me to the IRS. I talked to different people at the IRS and then hung up the phone after waiting for more than 1/2 hour for W2 Services.

Posted by Merlo 68 days and 1 hours ago.

Info Request

Hello Fishin,

Do you know why OK state tax was withheld from your check? Did you work or live in the state of OK at that time?

What exactly do you mean when you say you don't want to file a return with OK to claim a refund, otherwise you would be taxed by the IRS?? Have you not already reported this income to the IRS?

68 days ago.

Reply

I was hired and reported to work in the state of Washington. I was a resident of the state of Wa at the time that I was hired and had not lived in Oklahoma for more than 20 years. Wa has no state income tax at all. I worked for a contract house, PDS, which is based in Dallas Tx. They recieved THEIR income from a company in Tulsa Oklahoma for the work that I performed. This is probably where the mistake was made. Their mistake, not mine. I ALWAYS reported in Washington (at a Boeing facility in Everett).

 

As I understand it, if I file a return with Oklahoma to try to retrieve any of that money, then I will be taxed by the IRS on any money returned as it will be declared as income in the year that it is returned to me. It has ALREADY been taxed as income by the IRS even though it was witheld as state tax money, and so it should not be taxed again. I believe that my previous employer owes that money directly to me, without ANY taxes witheld.

Posted by Merlo 68 days ago.

Info Request

Hello again Fishin,

One more question please.

During the years that you had this OK tax withheld from your pay -- when you filed your federal returns for those years did you claim the standard deduction or did you itemize your deductions on your federal returns?

68 days ago.

Reply

My accountant filled out the Schedule A form for me, and so I used itemized deductions for those years.

Posted by Merlo 68 days ago.

Answer

Hello again Fishin,

The problem is that it is now much too late to get a corrected W-2 form. The IRS would not even accept an amended form at this time.

The only possible way that you can get a refund of these taxes is by filing a non-resident return with the state of OK. If you did not actually perform any work in that state, then by filing a non-resident return you would be entitled to a full refund of any taxes that you paid.

Now you said you did not want to pay taxes to the IRS on this same income, but actually if you itemized your deductions for those years, then these OK state taxes would have been claimed as a deduction on your tax return. So in effect, you really did not pay tax on the OK taxes which were deducted from your checks, because they would have been listed as a deduction on Schedule A.

Now if you receive a refund for the entire amount say in the year 2009, then you would include the refund amount as income on your 2009 return, and would be taxed at that time. And this would be legitimate, since you previously claimed the taxes as a deduction. Anytime that you claim state taxes as a deduction, if you later receive a refund then you must report that as income. It would be no different than if the OK taxes had never been withheld in the first place. If that were the case, you would not have had those to claim as a deduction on your federal return.   So the bottom line is that you are not going to any up paying federal taxes on anything more than you legitimately owe taxes on.

If you will look at your Schedule A for those years, line #5 should show a deduction for the OK state taxes you paid. And those deductions would have then reduced your federal income tax for those years. So you really have not paid federal tax on this money.

Check your Schedule A forms for those years, and let me know if you do not see where your accountant claimed these taxes as a deduction, and we can go from there. But he should have claimed them on line # 5, and it would then be correct that any refund you now receive would be taxable.

If this was helpful please press the Accept button. Positive feedback is also appreciated.

Thank you Fishin and let me know if you have more questions. I am happy to help you with whatever I can.



68 days ago.

Reply

It looks as though my accountant also overlooked the money withheld for state taxes for each of those years. The only taxes that show up in line 5 of the Sch A are local sales tax.

 

But your MAIN answer would seem to be that I will indeed need to file a return with the state of Oklahoma for those years, but as a non-resident of Okla. I think that this is going to have to be an acceptable answer for this exercise. I'll take it up with the accountant from here as to filing those Okla. returns and probably some ammended Schedule A's. He should have a good idea how to proceed with any tax obligations from here.

Accepted Answer

Hello again Fishin,

When you file Schedule A, on line 5 you are only allowed to claim one of the following tax deductions:

1. State income taxes paid OR
2. General sales tax

You cannot claim both. Most people claim the sales income taxes because usually it ends up being a higher deduction. But perhaps that was not true in your case. But your accountant did the right thing by only claiming one or the other, as both cannot be claimed.

But regardless of which tax he claimed (state income tax or sales tax) you would still now need to report this as income, since the IRS did allow you the choice. But you should still come out ahead on this. As an example, if you receive a $2,000 refund for OK taxes, your federal tax on that may only be 15% or 20% depending on your bracket. Whatever it is, it will certainly be better than losing the entire amount.

You need to file those returns with OK as soon as possible to still claim any refunds you are due.

If this was helpful please press the Accept button.

Thank yuou Fishin and let me know if you have more questions.

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Expert: Merlo
Pos. Feedback: 99.8 %
Accepts: 
Answered: 9/15/2009

Accountant

25+ years tax consulting. Specializing in returns for US citizens living abroad

67 days and 23 hours ago.

Reply

Not the answer I was hoping for, but quite helpful indeed.

 

Thanks so much for your time and input.

 

XXXXXX-X

Posted by Merlo 67 days and 23 hours ago.

Answer

Sorry Fishin, I can only tell you what your options are. I know they are not always what people want to hear.

Let me know if you need more help with this.

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