Avoid owing more income taxes next year

Posted by Mike Belt March 24, 2009 at 2:23 p.m.

By April 1 most of the nation’s workers will find the amounts on their paychecks a little higher than they used to be. That’s the date for implementation of the federal tax break known as Making Work Pay.

A few taxpayers, however, could find themselves owing more to the federal government next year at tax time if they aren’t careful.

New Internal Revenue Service withholding tables show some groups of workers may end up paying back next year what they got this year. Those affected could be dual-income households and individuals with multiple jobs.

The best way to find out the effect on you is to check with your employer and find out the steps to take to avoid owing extra money next year at this time. Or you can go to the IRS Web site, where there are new withholding tables. It may be necessary to adjust your W-4 withholding form.

Thieves looking for potential victims are conjuring up all sorts of tax scams. The No. 1 method is online phishing, according to the IRS. That involves sending e-mails to people designed to get them to reveal confidential information about bank accounts, credit cards and more. The IRS maintains it never uses e-mail to contact taxpayers about their personal tax issues.

More than 90 percent of the 52 million tax returns filed so far this year have been electronically filed, the IRS said.

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Reaper2K (anonymous) says…

The link in the second to last paragraph is broken. Good thing, too. The real Internal Revenue Service Web site ends with .gov (like all U.S. government sites). You want http://www.irs.gov/ - not what appears in the article. The .com URL takes you to banks.com, a deceptively official-looking site that deals with tax preparation.
March 24, 2009 at 3:57 p.m.
jcstepmom28 (anonymous) says…

Mike,
I have a problem with this sentence "The best way to find out the effect on you is to check with your employer and find out the steps to take to avoid owing extra money next year at this time"

Employers and Payroll Departments have no clue what your tax situation is or what your income tax return looks like, nor do we want to know.

What your employer/payroll office CAN do for you is confirm the amount of change the ARRA tax tables have on your Federal withholding, let you know how many payroll periods you have left in 2009 and possibly provide you with a sample of your taxes and net check based on a withholding change.

Don't ask us to be mind readers.
March 24, 2009 at 4:17 p.m.