Kent Carter has the Internal Revenue Service a little befuddled.

The IRS hasn’t been able to send him a federal tax refund because it doesn’t know where to send it.

Yet Carter has been receiving letters from the IRS informing him that the nation’s tax collection organization is looking for him.

“I get this letter that basically says, ‘Hey, we’re looking for you. Where are you?'” said Carter, of rural Lawrence.

Carter is one of more than 20 Lawrence residents on a list of 481 Kansans who have tax refunds coming to them from the IRS. They haven’t received their refunds because the IRS supposedly doesn’t have the right address for them. The checks the IRS owes Kansans range from $1 to more than $11,000.

“We want this money to get to the people it belongs to,” said Michael Devine, spokesman for the IRS in Kansas. “It’s really a simple process. As soon as we get a correct address, we can re-issue the check.”

Lawrence resident Kent Carter is one of 481 Kansans due tax refunds from the IRS. Carter has successfully received correspondence from the IRS informing him they are trying to locate him to provide him with his return, yet he has not actually received the check.

Carter knows his situation has been complicated because he lived overseas for several years working as a geologist. But he has lived at his current address for more than a year, and he is trying to make sure all the necessary IRS offices have that address, even though some IRS correspondence is getting to him anyway.

“Only in a bureaucracy,” an incredulous Carter said.

The average refund check amount for Kansans on the list is $584, according to the IRS. Nationwide there are 84,290 undelivered checks totaling more than $73 million.

Refund checks go astray for a variety of reasons, Devine said. People move, they get divorced and they get married, he said. The problem this year is complicated by the displacement of victims of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita.

• IRS.gov: Where’s My Refund?

Hurricane victims who haven’t received a refund should call (800) 562-5227. All others who think they may be due a refund should call (800) 829-1040.

Most of the Lawrence residents listed on the IRS “missing” list are not listed in the phone book, according to checks made by the Journal-World. Some are listed but the phone number is no longer valid.

Vickie Frazier is another Lawrence resident on the IRS list. She said she had moved three times and that probably caused the IRS to lose track of her.

Frazier, however, had called the IRS about two or three weeks ago and was told the check would be sent, she said.

“I should have had it by now,” Frazier said. “I’m sure waiting on it.”

Henry D. Stout, of Baldwin, said he always seemed to have problems with the IRS refunds.

“It’s been a fight for the past 10 years,” Stout, a self-employed plumber, said.

Carter said he thought the problem with his refund stemmed from abbreviating “lane” with “LN.” The LN isn’t read by whatever machine the IRS uses on the forms, he said. He has talked to an IRS representative by phone about his problem.

“It (the check) allegedly is being sent,” he said.