You need more information---so here goes----do not expect to get a refund of $4000. A credit is used first to reduce the tax you owe. After the $4000 of child tax credit was put on line 19, it was used to reduce any tax liability that you had. If anything was left over-----then it may be added to your refund on line 28.
The 2021 child-related credits were very generous. Lots of people are still being taken by surprise when they find out the credits for 2022 and 2023 are lower than they were for 2021.
The tax laws changed for child-related credits and are much less generous for 2022 and 2023.
Make sure you have entered your child as a dependent in My Info, and that you have entered the child's Social Security number. Careful— do not say that your child’s SSN is not valid for employment. If your child was born in 2023 make sure you said he lived with you the whole year. There is an oddly worded question that asks if the child paid over half their own support. Say NO to that question.
Have you entered income from working in 2023? If not, you will not receive an income tax refund based on having dependent children.
The rules for getting the child tax credit on a 2021 tax return and now on a 2023 return are very different. For 2021 you could get $3600 for a child under 6 or $3000 for a child between 6 and 17 even if you had no income/did not work. That is NOT the way it will work for your 2023 tax return. The “old” rules are back.
The maximum amount of the child tax credit is now $2000 per child; the refundable “additional child tax credit” amount is $1600. In order to get that credit, you have to have income from working. The credit is calculated based on the amount you earned above $2500 multiplied by 15%, up to the full $1600 per child. If the amount you earned was too low, you will not get the full $1600.
If your child is older than 16 at the end of 2023, you do not get the CTC. But you may still get the non-refundable $500 credit for other dependents instead.
https://ttlc.intuit.com/questions/1900923-what-is-the-child-tax-credit
https://ttlc.intuit.com/turbotax-support/en-us/help-article/taxation/additional-child-tax-credit/L6x...
https://www.irs.gov/help/ita/does-my-childdependent-qualify-for-the-child-tax-credit-or-the-credit-f...
**Disclaimer: Every effort has been made to offer the most correct information possible. The poster disclaims any legal responsibility for the accuracy of the information that is contained in this post.**
