Where’s my refund? How to track your 2020 tax refund to your bank account or
If you’re due a tax refund after submitting your 2020 tax return to the IRS, playing the waiting game to get your money can seem like the longest part of filing your taxes. Fortunately, you can track the status of any tax refund you might be owed, from start to finish.
This year, you have several good reasons to file early, rather than requesting an extension: First, the sooner you submit your taxes, the sooner you could get your 2020 tax refund. Second, you can claim any missing stimulus check money on your taxes as a Recovery Rebate Credit. Our chart below lays out some dates you could expect to see your tax refund.
To get your refund quicker, you can set up a direct deposit and file electronically instead of going the paper route — plus, you can start tracking your payment after 24 hours of filing electronically. This year especially, the IRS is asking taxpayers to avoid filing paper returns, if possible, to keep from compounding a current delay caused by a backlog from last year, when the tax deadline was extended due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Democrats have suggested extending the tax filing deadline this year, too.
Right now, we offer you two tools to help track your 2020 refund after you file your tax return. But you may also want to keep in mind that tax season could affect your payment for a potentialthird stimulus check of up to $1,400 per person. Here’s everything we know about when your own third check could arrive and how it could be more targeted, which could disqualify more people. This story is frequently updated.
2 IRS tools that help you track the status of your refund. Here’s how to use them
There are several things you’ll need on hand to track the status of your tax refund: Your Social Security number or Individual Taxpayer Identification Number, your filing status — for example, single, married or head of household — and your exact refund amount in whole dollars, which can be found on your tax return.
Using the IRS tool Where’s My Refund, enter your Social Security number or ITIN, your filing status and your exact refund amount, then press Send. If you entered your information correctly, you’ll be taken to a page that shows the status of your refund. If not, you may be asked to verify your personal tax data and try again. If all the information looks correct, you’ll need to enter the date you filed your taxes, along with how you filed — either electronically or on paper.
There’s also a mobile app you can use to check your tax refund status called IRS2Go, which is useful if you’re constantly checking to see when your refund will arrive.
The IRS updates the data in this tool overnight each day, so if you don’t see a status change after 24 hours or more, check back the next day.
What the status of your current tax refund means
When looking at the status of your tax refund in the IRS tool, you will see one of three messages.
- Received: The IRS now has your tax return and is working…
Read More: Where’s my refund? How to track your 2020 tax refund to your bank account or