Why Your Tax Refund May Be Late This Year

Sandra Martensen is worried. She and her husband mailed their paper tax return to the Internal Revenue Service on April 7, claiming a refund of about $1,600. Since then she has heard nothing from the IRS. She has tried repeatedly to get information from the IRS’s Where’s My Refund online tool and phone number, but both say there’s no record of the tax return.

She wonders if she should refile her return or file an amended return. “I don’t want them to come to me in November and say, ‘We haven’t heard from you’,” says Ms. Martensen,…