Just Cancel It

Turns out I may be able to avoid bouncing a “check” to the IRS after all. The other day I told my tale of woe to one of our accountant s who does taxes on the side and she recommended that just mail in a payment using Form 1040-V. This way when the payment gets there they will credit my account, so that when the attempt at an electronic transfer fails the money would already be there. I might just avoid the penalty that way. I figure, what the heck it is worth a shot.

While hunting around on the IRS website looking for the forms I stumbled on a page about Pay Taxes by Electronic Funds Withdrawal and there near the bottom is a procedure for canceling a payment in cases sort of like mine:

Taxpayers can call the Treasury Financial Agent, Customer Service, at 1-888-353-4537, toll-free, to cancel a payment or to report problems such as bank closures, lost or stolen bank account numbers, closed bank accounts or unauthorized transactions. Customer Service is available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Dude, the solution is just a phone call away. I’d better get on it so I can mail Uncle Sam a real check…