Paid $25 to get my refund early this year but also claimed the ACTC?

Forum|Forum|1 year ago
January 21, 2025
2 replies
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Hello! I filed taxes a couple of days ago and was just accepted today. I paid TurboTax the $25 to get my refund early and it gives me an estimated date of 2/11 for a deposit. However, I did claim the ACTC and I know that doing so causes the IRS to hold your refund due to the PATH Act. Does TurboTax take this into consideration when offering the early refund? Is there any chance that I will get it before 2/15 because I paid extra or will I just be refunded that amount? When I filed, I was under the impression that I would get it five days earlier than the date I was given but I don't even think that's possible with the PATH Act?

I guess I'm trying to just get a timeframe for when this will come because I'm a little confused now. It seems like something that TurboTax should be taking into account when offering the early refunds? Thanks in advance.

TurboTax Free Edition Online

CatinaT1

Due to PATH Act, the IRS holds refunds for EITC/ACTC customers until March 3.

{Edited 1/24/2025}

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racheboorma88

That kind of makes sense. I'm in the same situation. I have the path hold for eitc and ctc. I paid the $25 to receive my refund 5 days early. My estimated refund day on TurboTax says February 7th. That is way before the path date. When should I expect to receive my refund? I feel like this was really sneaky of TurboTax to offer this option to people without explaining. Also I paid my fees with my refund, so my refund first gets sent to stpg to pay my fees before I receive my refund. I smell a lawsuit coming on for false representation. If they don't give us back our $25 that we paid, is TurboTax just going to say that or refund was 5 days earlier than it would have been. How do we prove otherwise?

Opus 17

Employee

@racheboorma88 wrote:

That kind of makes sense. I'm in the same situation. I have the path hold for eitc and ctc. I paid the $25 to receive my refund 5 days early. My estimated refund day on TurboTax says February 7th. That is way before the path date. When should I expect to receive my refund? I feel like this was really sneaky of TurboTax to offer this option to people without explaining. Also I paid my fees with my refund, so my refund first gets sent to stpg to pay my fees before I receive my refund. I smell a lawsuit coming on for false representation. If they don't give us back our $25 that we paid, is TurboTax just going to say that or refund was 5 days earlier than it would have been. How do we prove otherwise?

Any date turbotax gives you is meaningless. Probably based on a general assumption that most refunds are paid in 3 weeks. Use the IRS "Where's my refund" web site to track the progress of your tax refund. That's where the 5 day advance notice comes from. In most cases (I can't promise all cases) the IRS provides advance notice. Essentially, your tax return can be approved for refund on any particular day, but refunds are only paid once or twice a week on a particular schedule. The IRS used to publish a calendar for tax professionals that said something like, "refunds approved between 2/1 and 2/5 will be paid on 2/10; refunds approved from 2/6-2/10 will be paid on 2/15", and so on. I don't know if that still exists, but you should see something on "Where's my refund" once the IRS officially opens e-filing.

The $25 "5-day early" offer states in the fine print that this is based on the IRS providing 5 days advance notice, but that all payment of refunds is solely up to the IRS. The offer also states that if it is not possible to pay the refund 5 days early, you will not be charged the $25. I don't know if that will be automatic or if you will have to make a claim.

Opus 17

Employee

The program assumes that the IRS provides notification of a pending deposit 5 days before the actual deposit. You can usually see this in "where's my refund"; it might say something like "refund approved, payment expected on February 28" (just as an example). Turbotax would credit you 5 days in front of that date. But ultimately, the IRS pays whenever they pay, and Turbotax has no control over that.