Your tax return may have been reflecting your receiving the Recovery Rebate Credit, as if you had not received the stimulus payment. When you entered the stimulus you received, it eliminated the credit on your return, thus reducing your refund by the amount of the credit.
The Recovery Rebate Credit is a credit that was authorized by the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act. So, if you were eligible for an Economic Impact payment, commonly referred to as a stimulus payment, but did not receive one or you received less than the full amount as an advanced payment in 2020 then you can claim the Recovery Rebate Credit on your 2020 tax return. Generally, the credit can increase your refund amount or lower the taxes you may owe.
For more information, see: What is a Recovery Rebate Tax Credit?
Finishing up TT Deluxe for '21. All systems go, till the speed bump "Federal Review." Stimulus receipts entered are confirmed and the answer - "Yes" is bulleted. Also bulleted is my tax due, interestingly in the same amount of the #3 stimulus received. OUCH! Is this a new payback stimulus? HELP help
help
Where is the brake pedal on this version of TT?
If I select "No" the tax amount is reduced by the stimulus amount. So, while simple math was abandoned a century ago, I feel as if a stimulus number should move only one way, from giver to receiver. Help
help help help
What you may not realize is that as soon as you began to prepare your tax return, the software was giving you the $1400 and it was shown on that "refund monitor" -----but when you entered that you received it already, the software had to reconcile the payment you received, You cannot get it twice---so it looked to you like you "lost" $1400. You did not lose it---you just cannot receive it twice.