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The stimulus money you get for claiming your children is based on your 2020 tax return.    When they hurried to send out checks last year they could not wait for people to file tax returns so they used either 2018 or 2019 information that was in the system already.   

 

But the credit was an advance on a credit you get on your 2020 return.   The way it worked means  in some divorce situations etc when parents "take turns" with claiming the child etc. a parent may have gotten the stimulus for a child based on their 2018 or 2019 return and they do not have to pay it back even if they did not claim the child for 2020.   But .....the parent who does claim the child in 2020 gets stimulus for the child---in other words stimulus is being paid out twice for the same child in many cases.  That is how they wrote the law.

 

You do get to claim all the stimulus money for round #1 and round #2 for the children who are claimed on your 2020 tax return.

**Disclaimer: Every effort has been made to offer the most correct information possible. The poster disclaims any legal responsibility for the accuracy of the information that is contained in this post.**