State Income Tax - Corrected W2

[Kat734]

In 2019 I worked in both CA and WI, and thus paid state taxes to both states. I returned to only WI in October of 2019 and did not set foot in CA in 2020. My employer made a mistake in my documents and I paid CA State income taxes and they initially listed my entire income as as taxable in CA. 

I've received a W2c that removes my taxable income for CA and Turbotax is telling me that it doesn't think I need to submit a CA submission. However, I think if I don't submit anything to California I won't get the taxes my company already paid to CA back. Is that accurate? Do I need to purchase CA and submit an additional file? Or will the W2c already account for that change in my federal return?

[DianeW777]

You are correct.  If the state tax withholding was paid to California (CA) by your employer and you did not work there in 2020, you must file a return to obtain a full refund. You will indicate you were a nonresident and you should put zero earnings in CA on the W-2 in the federal section of TurboTax, but make sure to put the withholdings for CA.

For clarification, there are two potential actions.

1. if the W-2c shows no CA state withholding then no return is required and any tax withheld must be reimbursed by your employer.
2. If the W-2c shows no CA taxable income (as you noted), but the CA state tax withholding is still present, then you must follow the instruction above and file the CA return to obtain the refund because this is where your employer paid the tax.