14 Corrections and Refund Claims in Your Home Country
Question for this chapter. Once you have moved to the United States, can you still go back to a tax return you filed in your home country to correct it or ask for tax back, and what does that do to your U.S. filing?
Answer. It depends on the country, and the written evidence is stronger for some than for others. The chapter lays out a route table for each of six home countries, marking every cell as confirmed, partly confirmed or not confirmed, and refund time limits are better documented than correction time limits. On the U.S. side, if a foreign tax is later refunded or adjusted and that changes your U.S. tax, you report it with an amended return and a revised foreign tax credit form, plus a summary schedule with the current-year return.
What to check
- Which home-country authority handles corrections and refunds, and whether the route is online or on paper.
- Whether the refund time limit and the correction time limit are both stated for your country, since one may be known while the other is not.
- Whether people living abroad or holding foreign income can use the same route, which is stated for some countries and left open for others.
- Whether tax was withheld at source, such as on a property sale, and how the final tax compares with what was already paid.
- Whether a foreign refund or adjustment changes the foreign tax credit you claimed in an earlier U.S. year.
What to confirm. Check the status label on each row of your country's table, and treat any cell marked as not confirmed as an open question to settle with the home-country tax office or a qualified adviser.
One-line summary. Reopening a home-country return after moving to the U.S. is possible in some places, and any foreign refund or adjustment may need to be reported to the IRS.
The full chapter is in the book. The web shows only each chapter's question, answer, checkpoints and one-line summary.