topic State tax refund in After you file

State tax refund

Saba3 — Mon, 23 Feb 2026 11:51:33 GMT

My Arkansas state tax refund is not the same as what was taken from my paychecks. Turbo tax showed that I didn’t owe any money, so why am I not being refunded the entire amount?

Re: State tax refund

xmasbaby0 — Wed, 22 Feb 2023 19:45:14 GMT

Why do you think you get all of it back? How would your state get money if everyone just got all of it back? The people who live and work in your state can have a tax liability. Apparently you earned enough income in your state that you have a tax liability----so the state gets to keep some of your money.

Re: State tax refund

BillM223 — Wed, 22 Feb 2023 19:56:04 GMT

There are some possibilities:

1. The state of Arkansas recalculated the tax due and decided that you owed some tax after all. (not likely this quickly)

2. You owed the state some tax from a previous year, which was applied to your current refund.

3. You accidently marked that some of your refund should be applied to next year.

4. There may be an "offset" applied to your state refund, such as unpaid child support. If this is the case, you will need to contact the Arkansas Department of Revenue and ask. This is more likely than the other options.

Re: State tax refund

xmasbaby0 — Wed, 22 Feb 2023 19:58:27 GMT

@BillM223 It sounds like the user does not understand why they are not getting back everything they see in box 17 of the W-2.

Re: State tax refund

BillM223 — Wed, 22 Feb 2023 20:43:32 GMT

My perception is that the OP has a good understanding of how taxation works. So I read it that the OP had zero tax assessed (could happen if the taxable income is below the limit or if the OP has credits that wipe out the tax assessed), and so reasonably expected that 100% of the withholding should be returned.

Unless the OP returns with a clarification, we won't know which way the OP meant it.