The news and updates keep coming, sometimes even many times a day. It’s a lot to take in and often hard to keep track of. We even created a resource to help you know what’s happening with COVID-19 as it relates to the airlines, hotels, general coronavirus information, and your stimulus check.
Your Stimulus Check Updates and Deadline Reminders
I’d categorize these three stimulus check and payments updates as weird-but-true, good, and the getting better updates.
IRS Website Hack For Coronavirus Stimulus Checks
We’ve all had the experience of going to a website, filling out all the personal information requested, checking it over for correctness, submitting the information and then……..it fails. We know it’s accurate so what the heck happened? We’d really love a hack for this especially if it were to happen while filling out an IRS form, right?
Well, weird but true, a hack has been discovered for the IRS site when you run into issues checking for the status of your stimulus check. It involves using ALL CAPS. See, I told you it was weird!
Have you been trying to learn the status of your IRS coronavirus check and received the dreaded error message “payment status not available”? If so, enter your street address in all caps and see if that makes a difference.
The IRS did have a major update to its site this week. However, if logging in remains an issue for you and you’ve entered your street address the usual way, try again using all capital letters and see if this hack works for you.
Those of you who know programming might understand the reasoning behind using all capital letters. The LA Times reports that it has to do with “arcane programming” used by the federal government. Most of us, myself included, don’t really care why this works, do we? We’re just thrilled it works!
Hundreds of people report this as a workaround that indeed worked for them. Certainly can’t hurt giving it a try if you’re having login issues and can’t enter your bank information required to receive your stimulus payment by direct deposit.
The IRS says it has upgraded the coronavirus stimulus payment app.
This is the getting better news. The IRS web portal and app, which first launched on April 15, has gotten an upgrade to help make the process smoother. Though the IRS isn’t saying exactly what changes were made, IRS Commissioner Chuck Rettig is quoted as saying, “These further enhancements will help even more taxpayers.” He urges people who haven’t received a payment date yet to visit Get My Payment again for the latest information. Hopefully the portal and app will behave as expected, but if not, there’s always the hack mentioned above!
Don’t forget these two upcoming stimulus payment deadlines and act fast!
1. Once the IRS has scheduled a delivery date for your stimulus payment, The Get My Payment site cannot update your bank account information. Act fast if you intend to use the payment portal.
2. May 5th deadline for veterans or SSI beneficiary with kids. By May 5th you’ll need to get the government the information on your eligible dependents. Meet the deadline and they can be included in your stimulus payments. Here’s all you need to know about the deadline and when money will be dispersed.
Are You A Spanish Speaker?
There’s good news for anyone who speaks Spanish. Do you prefer to have a form in Spanish? Would that help with the required information needed to receive a stimulus payment? Then help is on its way. Currently there is only an English IRS portal for stimulus payments. A Spanish-language version of the site is expected to be available in a few weeks.
Final Thoughts
So there we have it. The most current pieces of IRS stimulus check news to start the week. Remember to check our resource if you need more information on this topic as well as the current airline news related to coronavirus. We keep the resource updated daily.
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