Form 8812

[JMH351]

Regarding this form, turbo tax must have generated it, I am not familiar with it at all.  At the end when it checked for errors or incomplete data, that form came up with the question, was your principal place of abode in the US for more then 1/2 the year, yes or no.  Which the answer would be yes, it was.  When I checked the yes box, my refund increased by thousands of dollars and I don't think that's right.  Even if I check no, it still increases.  If I leave it unchecked, my refund goes to the amount I feel it should be.  The research i did on that form makes me wonder if it's even relevant to me.  I do have a child that's a dependent, but she has a normal social security number.  Can someone explain this to me in some simple terms?

[xmasbaby0]

That is the form for the child tax credit.

https://ttlc.intuit.com/questions/1900923-what-is-the-child-tax-credit

[JMH351]

Is this something different from other years?  I know I've typically got a deduction of $3,600, or something close to that in previous years for a dependent.  I question it because it's changing my refund significantly, it's way more then previous years and I have close to the same income as previous years with similar deductions.  The instructions are confusing to me, I have a hard time understanding them, turbo tax was easy for me to use to do my own taxes, but recent years I end up running into things I don't understand.

[xmasbaby0]

@JMH351 The child tax credit was changed by Congress for 2021.   For a child under the age of 6 the 2021 child tax credit is $3600; if your child is age 6 to 17 it is $3000.

https://ttlc.intuit.com/community/children-or-dependents/help/child-tax-credit-info-center/00/255996...