I now owe the government the child tax payment back. Why? We qualified.

[xmasbaby0]

We cannot see your tax return so cannot tell why you would owe the CTC back. 

The IRS is sending out letter 6419 to you.  It will show the amount of advance child tax credit that you received during 2021.  Enter the information from that letter carefully.   The remaining amount of CTC that you can receive will show up on line 28 of your 2021 Form 1040.

PREVIEW 1040

https://ttlc.intuit.com/questions/1901539-how-do-i-preview-my-turbotax-online-return-before-filing

Click on Tax Tools on the left side of the screen. Click on Tools. Click on View Tax Summary. Click on Preview my 1040 on the left side of the screen.

NOTE:   The CTC is indeed a “credit” that can be applied toward any tax liability that you would otherwise have to pay to the IRS.

[fanfare]

@jakegreen93 

It can happen if your dependents or filing status changed from what the IRS assumed about you.

It can also happen if you enter your dependent information incorrectly.

It can also happen if the enter the advance payment for both yourself and your spouse. That would be reporting receipt of 2x what is allowed.

[Critter-3]

First the Refund-O-Meter is only correct once all your income and expenses have been entered and the program is fully operational. With each entry of income or expenses the meter will continue to vary as the program recalculates the return with each step you take.  If this annoys you then turn off the meter until the end.   

Next ... the program interview flow is  poorly designed  and it  will give you a false refund total early in the interview.   The program gives you 100% of the CTC and the third stimulus credit once you have completed the MY INFO tab early in the interview  and  then much   later in the deductions & Credits tab  you are asked how much of these credits you got in advance and then the credits are adjusted for the advance payments which will show as a reduced refund amount or an increase in the balance due.  

Same thing for the EIC … the program gives you the credit in the refund posted BEFORE  you get to the EIC portion of the interview.  At that point it asks you a couple of questions that could possibly REMOVE the credit already reflected in the refund posted  which is also a point of confusion for many. 

One day the programmers may  get this changed to more timely reflect the section you are working on as you work on it and not way in advance.  Users are not happy when they see the refund being reduced without a good explanation.