Refund HELP

[rfentin]

I sent in my son's very simple tax return on 3/4/22.  There has not been a refund sent.  When i go online with him at IRS website "Refund" it continues to say there is no information or I must have done something incorrectly -- Everything is correct - SS#, amount of refund and date.

It was a paper return mailed in.

I cannot find anyway to get anyone to talk to or contact.  I am concerned maybe a check was stolen or??? 

It has been over 12 weeks. 

Any help is appreciated

[DoninGA · Accepted solution]

Mailed 2021 federal tax returns are taking 6 months or longer before the IRS will start to process the return.  Until the return starts to be processed by the IRS there will not be any federal tax refund status on the IRS website - https://www.irs.gov/refunds

Go to this IRS website for the current status of 2021 tax returns - https://www.irs.gov/newsroom/irs-operations-during-covid-19-mission-critical-functions-continue

As of June 17, 2022, we had 11.2 million unprocessed individual returns which include returns received before 2022, and new tax year 2021 returns. Of these, 2 million returns require error correction or other special handling, and 9.2 million are paper returns waiting to be reviewed and processed. This work does not typically require us to correspond with taxpayers but does require special handling by an IRS employee so, in these instances, it is taking the IRS more than 21 days to issue any related refund and in some cases this work could take 90 to 120 days. If a correction is made to any Recovery Rebate Credit, Child Tax Credit, Earned Income Tax Credit or Additional Child Tax Credit claimed on the return, the IRS will send taxpayers an explanation. Taxpayers are encouraged to continue to check Tax Season Refund Frequently Asked Questions.

[NCperson]

@rfentin - the IRS processes paper returns in the order received.  AS they are woefully backlogged, they announced earlier this week that they had just completed all paper returns submitted through December, 2021.  

That mean they have yet to process any 2021 tax year paper filed returns as obviously they were not submitted until 2022!!!

As others are stating figure the backlog is 6-9 months from the time of the paper submission.  All you can do is have patience.  Filing a second time only makes things worse. 

https://www.irs.gov/newsroom/irs-continues-work-on-inventory-of-tax-returns-original-tax-returns-fil...

"Due to issues related to the pandemic and staffing limitations, the IRS began 2022 with a larger than usual inventory of paper tax returns and correspondence filed during 2021. The IRS took a number of steps to address this, and the agency is on track to complete processing of originally filed Form 1040 (individual tax returns without errors) received in 2021 this week.