@ alicewebb wrote:
Thank you for responding to my email. My federal taxes were approved and my refund was sent to my bank on 3/16. The problem is my bank doesn't have records of a direct deposit. My bank said I needed a tracking number. I've been calling and calling and calling the IRS with no luck. Trying to actually reach someone is impossible.
Edited for clarification 3/26/2022 at 6:25 PM Pacific
Here are some possibilities:
1) Did you have any TurboTax fees that you chose to pay out of your Federal refund? If so, that's handled by a third-party bank that receives your deposit from the IRS into a temporary bank account in your name, subtracts the fees, then sends the rest to your bank account in a second direct deposit. If you DID use that service, we can tell you more about that process and how to check with the company that handles that (SBTPG). If it went to SBTPG's bank, then the IRS would still say it was sent to "your bank" because that's what it thinks; i.e., the IRS would think SBTPG's bank is your bank.
2) Could you have chosen to deposit it somewhere other than your bank checking account, such as onto a prepaid debit card, or into a brokerage account?
3) In a previous comment you said your return had the wrong account number. If it was go directly from the IRS to your bank account (i.e., no third-party service to pay any fees out of the refund), and if refused by your bank, it would go back to the IRS who would issue a check in the mail.
However, if the refund was coming from the third-party SBTPG (fees paid out of Federal refund), and that second direct deposit was refused by your bank, it would go back to SBTPG's bank, who would be the one issuing you a refund check in the mail. If you used that service, we can tell you how to check on it at SBTPG's website.
If your bank is referring to an ACH tracking number, then the sender who initiated the ACH transfer would have that info. If it was going directly from the IRS to your bank account, the IRS would be able to trace the ACH deposit. If it was going from SBTPG's bank to your bank account, then SBTPG's bank would be the one to account for it.
