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To speed things up, you may be able to e-file your amended return. For federal income tax purposes, you have three years from the due date of the original return to file your amended return. But you’ll want to act relatively quickly.

If you need to fix your tax return, you’ll file Form 1040X, Amended U.S. Doing so will significantly slow down processing and possibly flag your return for examination. Fixing Your Mistakesīut what if you make a mistake? Or, what if-as is increasingly the case in 2021-you want to use a different filing status to qualify for a stimulus check or a Covid-19 relief-related tax credit, but you’ve already filed your tax return? Before you file another return, here’s what you need to know.įirst things first: If you need to amend your tax return, do not file a second tax return. If, however, you don’t remarry for the next two years and you have a qualifying child or stepchild for whom you provided more than half of the household expenses, you may able to file as a qualifying widow(er). If you remarry, you’ll file as married with your new spouse, and your deceased spouse’s filing status will be married filing separately for the year. If your spouse died during the year, you are considered married for the whole year-unless you remarry before the end of the tax year. Qualifying widow(er) with dependent child You may also want to file as MFS to avoid an offset of your refund if your spouse has outstanding debts like child support arrears or past-due student loans. That can happen if you do not want to be responsible for your spouse’s share of the tax, or because filing separately may result in a lower total tax.

It’s simply a tax choice where married taxpayers opt to file separate returns. Despite its unfriendly sounding name, MFS doesn’t have anything to do with the state of your marriage. It typically doesn’t matter whether you lived together or how you referred to yourself: Married is married.Īs a married person, you can file as married filing jointly (MFJ) or married filing separately (MFS). 31, you are considered married for the year: it doesn’t matter if you got married that same day.

HOH can be tricky, since you can also use this status if you are considered unmarried according to IRS rules for a still-married taxpayer, that means that you lived apart from your spouse during the last six months of the tax year and filed a separate return (you must still provide more than half of the household expenses for a qualifying child or dependent). If you aren’t married and you provide more than half of the household expenses for a qualifying child or dependent, you may be able to file as Head of Household. If you aren’t married on the last day of the year-either because you were never legally married or you were legally separated or divorced, according to the laws of your state-you can file as single. There’s no math, no crazy formulas: just one date to consider. That’s because, for federal income tax status, marital status is determined by state law as of the last day of the calendar year (Dec. There are five options: single, head of household, married filing jointly, married filing separately, and qualifying widow(er) with dependent child.įor the most part, it’s a pretty straightforward question. One of the first things you do when filing your federal income tax return is tick the box at the top indicating your filing status.