From: Coral Springs, FL

Dear TaxMama,

My ex-employer never sent a 1099 last year to me. I contacted him and never got a response.

How can I file without my 1099?

Everytime I file my refund is taken away by the State for past due child support.

My ex-wife has yet to receive any money.

Who can we contact for the whereabouts of the money?

Everyone is passing the buck and redirecting us.

Steven

 

Oh please, Steven,

Clearly, you are totally helpless.

The first instruction I give people who want answers to questions from TaxMama is to search the site. All you had to do was enter 1099 in the site's Google search engine. It would have given you any number of answers to this same question, with specific information on what to do.

What it boils down to, Steve, is that if you're getting 1099s, you're in business for yourself.

DEAL WITH IT. TAKE RESPONSIBILITY.

That means YOU keep books and records about your income and your expenses. It's not up to your customers or clients to tell you how much you've earned.

The purpose of the 1099 is not to inform you. It's to squeal on you to IRS. That's the information IRS uses to make sure you report all your income.

As to money being taken by your state? Florida doesn't have a income tax. So it's not going to your state's tax department.

The refunds that are being taken are from your IRS refunds. Ask IRS to give you a printout of who is getting the money.

Even without it - Ask your dear ex who she filed a complaint with to get your refunds grabbed.

In general, if you ever watch the legal dramas on TV, you would know that the district attorney's office is typically the agency that goes after dead-beat dads. Even when it's initiated by Social Services or one of the Dependent Care agencies, the legal end comes from the DA's office.

Contact the Florida state attorney general's office and ask them to track down the money.

And be persistent. If you don't locate it - you'll always be in arrears.

In the meantime, you can put a stop to all these levies altogether by simply taking responsibility and setting up a payment plan to catch up on the back child support yourself.

It's amazing how nice those agencies can be if you cooperate voluntarily and they don't have to use force to extract funds from you.

Sorry if this is harsher than you'd like. But you look like some who's just sitting there waiting for life to happen to him.

Take charge of your life and get it into shape!

Best wishes,
Eva Rosenberg, MBA, EA