Level 12

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Expatriate Earned Income Tax Credit

Forum|Forum|5 years ago
May 4, 2021
5 replies
21 views

Let me preface my remarks by stating that I am asking this question on behalf of a friend and colleague who uses another software... He has shared information with me in the past , that I have then shared on this forum to help Pro Series/Intuit users , so I do not think there is anything wrong with trying to help him... We all have colleagues that use different software and we all learn from each other.. his client is married filing joint and lived in the USA for the whole year until moving in December to England... They did not have much income in 2020 due to economic recession. He believes they are eligible for the credit since they lived in the USA for over 6 months in 2020 but maybe something is being overlooked... his software says they are not eligible for the credit because they have a foreign address and his software does not have an enable error conversion checkbox that he can uncheck like our software does , so he cannot file a return even if there is one error.... thank you in advance for any useful comments...

ProSeries Professional

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Best answer by BobKamman

Is your question about EIC, or about e-filing? Can they file a return with a foreign address, even without EIC? According to this undated advice from the State Department, there are eight software companies that allow e-filing from a foreign address. Drake is not one of them. Neither is Intuit.

https://photos.state.gov/libraries/france/5/irs/efiling.pdf

T

TaxGuyBill

Level 15

You are correct that currently having a foreign address would not disqualify EIC.

But he may want to check if that is actually why the software is denying EIC. If he enters a US address, does it give it to him?

PATAXAuthor

Level 12

Thanks for the response tax guy Bill oh, I just called him and asked him that question and he said that they do get the credit if they use there USA address... The husband was of English descent/birth but was living here in the USA for the last 10 years with a green card , the wife was born and raised here in America

IRonMaN

Level 15

Questions like this always make me curious - what software is he using? Is it a $29.95 software that works as good as it can for $29.95 or is it a $29,950 software that is so complicated that pilot error is involved?

Slava Ukraini!

PATAXAuthor

Level 12

Thanks for the response Iron Man... He uses Drake software, which receives good reviews and I believe is in the top five

sjrcpa

Level 15

In the EIC worksheet or 8867 is there a question to answer about living in the US for >6 months?

Has he contacted Drake support?

The more I know the more I don’t know.

PATAXAuthor

Level 12

thanks for the reply sjr.. To your first question I think it does and that is why he does get the credit if he uses their USA address ... In regards to your second question, I think he said he did call but it did not resolve the issue... He also called a tax question research service of one of the tax preparer organizations .... Maybe it is some type of technicality, I'm not sure ... thanks

PATAXAuthor

Level 12

Correction on that last reply, I just sent him a text message and he said he called a tax research service but he has not yet called Drake... Drake software does have good reviews for good Technical and customer support which I believe is all based here in the USA, but I may be wrong... Just my opinion....

PATAXAuthor

Level 12

Update... Colleague said he just called his tax software provider and issue could not be resolved... He may end up having to ask the client if they wish to mail the return in.... E-filing is great when it works but sometimes there is no alternative other than asking client to mail the return in... Just my opinion...

BobKammanAnswer

Level 15

Is your question about EIC, or about e-filing? Can they file a return with a foreign address, even without EIC? According to this undated advice from the State Department, there are eight software companies that allow e-filing from a foreign address. Drake is not one of them. Neither is Intuit.

https://photos.state.gov/libraries/france/5/irs/efiling.pdf

PATAXAuthor

Level 12

Thanks for the reply Bob... The foreign address must be the issue then , since he said if he used the US address then there would be no errors...

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