(Photo by Towson Families United)The tax clinic on Friday actually went really well. I thought I overheard that we ended up helping about 30 people file their taxes!
The event was allll day (8am to 730 pm) at the Caldwell Center in north Toledo on Jan. 29 (National Earned Income Tax Credit Awareness Day). (I DID remember to bring my camera -- BUT then I forgot and then was too busy to take any pictures.)
The morning started off rough because fellow VISTA Maureen and I were there at 8 am to set up for the 9 am opening time. There were supposed to be about 7 other counselors coming, but it got to be 10 minutes to start time -- and we were still the only two there.
When the first client walked in the door and still it was only Maureen and I....yikes!
Thankfully, the rest showed up shortly after 9. Good thing, because foot traffic was steady all day. I don't think anyone walking in had to wait long for a counselor, so that was nice.
At one point, a TV news crew showed up and was filming, although I didn't ever get a chance to watch the news, so I don't know if I got on TV. From talking to clients throughout the day, it sounded like a lot of them came after hearing coverage on TV rather than seeing the flyers Maureen and I hung. Oh well.
I have to admit, I was pretty nervous about actually doing a live person's taxes because, hey, taxes are complicated, man! Who knows what crazy situations people will walk in with? And of course, I can't admit to the person that this is the very first tax return I've ever done (besides my own, sort of)...My dad kind of chuckles whenever he thinks of me acting as a tax counselor.
I ended up doing 4.5 people's taxes as well as a couple benefits applications.
(The half is because my very first client ended up getting an hour in before we discovered that she had a situation the OBB doesn't support. After phone calls to the IRS, she decided to stop and just take her taxes to her accountant friend. I felt bad for her wasted time. But now I know. And will be more careful about talking things over first. Lesson learned.)
The easiest return was a teenager who worked at a fast food joint. She came in with one W-2 and a friend and they just giggled and texted half the time. But whatevs.
One guy had a disabled child living at home, but had never gotten a credit for the EITC. I thought he should have, and the software agreed! So instead of a couple hundred dollar refund he got almost $4,000! Needless to say, he was pretty happy.
I got some congratulatory emails from some Americorps higher-ups for catching that, BUT I'm too paranoid yet to feel good about it because I'm worried the IRS will redflag that sudden change and audit him and for some reason not accept the disability claim and take back the credit. And then the guy will hate me and owe the goverment money back and be disbarred from claiming that credit ever again, etc etc. Stressful!
Each person is going to hear back within a few days whether their return was accepted or rejected. The software is the "expert," but I'm still positive I did something wrong and every single one of those returns will be rejected. I'm dreading one of those phone calls, both because I'll have to deal with it and also because I'll feel bad.
Man, for being a generally optimistic person, I can be pretty negative.
But maybe it will all work out?
Fingers crossed.
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