I love getting mail. I'll be the first to admit (maybe a close second) that I check my email periodically throughout the day. I love being the first one home at the end of the day to be the one to gather the various envelopes and coupon booklets from our little mail box. I love personal letters to me the most. Especially from our government.
The IRS wrote me a personal letter today. They kindly informed me that I did my taxes incorrectly WAY back there in 2005 and they want to "settle up." Unaware of just what my friends over there at the IRS were talking about, I recruited a friend (Brent Corbin) who knew a little bit more about their lingo. And in fact, it turns out that my government friends were right after all and that I did owe them a bit of money. I was glad to write that check today. I drew a smiley face on it. I wanted to let them know that I appreciated their meticulous attention to detail.
But here is what I don't understand. They sent me this "letter" with the various boxes that they had information for and compared those boxes with what I filled in. So, they have all the information they need. They have all the forms, files, data, and information available to them and they just compare their numbers with mine. Mine, apparently, were wrong. But why did I have to give them my numbers in the first place?? They already have them. If they are simply comparing the "right" answers (theirs) with mine, why not save a step and just have their, right answers? What is the point in me giving up an entire weekend of my life to crunch numbers, comb through confusing forms, and come up with some document that they already possess? Is this just some elaborate civil test of my ethics? I honestly don't understand the point.
But again, I obviously don't understand the whole system anyway, given that my governmental friends are kindly sending me personal letters that essentially say, "Pay us what you owe now or we will severely screw up the rest of your life."
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You have to send in your forms in case there's a mistake. Like there was for me. My employer sent in a form, and the decimal point was misread or ignored or something at the IRS. Instead of making $2,000 at my part time job, they thought I made $200,000. So they sent me a letter saying, "What about that $17,000 in taxes you owe us? Pay up or go to jail." So after months of trying to fix this and having an actual lawyer help me... it's resolved.
And that's why you have to do your taxes, I guess. Yuck.
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