I need a ruling here…
In 2004 I was painfully married to my now ex-wife. I was the sole income and we filed joint tax returns.
I messed up and didn’t file state taxes for 2004. The story, and I’m sticking to it, is that I thought we were due a pittance of a return. I thought I didn’t have to file at all if I were due a return and since it was a pittance, forget it.
A couple months ago I received a letter from the state informing me of my mistake and saying they’d like $750 in back taxes plus about $250 in fees, interest, and penalties. It’ s just shy of $1000.
I panicked, called the ex- and told her about the letter. I told her I would investigate and get back to her. I rummaged, miraculously found enough old paper to actually calculate my 2004 taxes, and thought I calculated that the state owed us rather than the reverse. I thought we were due back $400 from that year.
I called the state and they told me to send the paperwork and they’d look it over.
I called the ex-wife and informed her and she said she wanted half.
“Why?” I asked, “It’s a refund on my income.”
“Well”, she said, “if we had to pay you’d want me to pay half, right?”
Fair enough, she’s right, I’d want her to pay half, I agreed to send it to her half the refund.
Fast forward a month or so and I’m doing paperwork to send to the state for 2004. All a sudden the papers say I have to pay, not receive. I know it’s better to give than receive but not when it’s taxes. I panic again, do the taxes yet again, and the damned papers say the same thing. I have to pay. My math puts the amount within $3 of the states amount so I think the state was right after all.
I call the ex-.
(You can hear this coming, can’t you?)
It’s my problem she says. I should pay it.
She contacts a lawyer and the lawyer confirms that she’s on the hook for it legally but it’s unlikely, since she didn’t have any income that year, that they’ll actually go after her for it, they’ll go after me.
So, while she’s liable, she’s not really targeted and if she just hides over here, they’ll garnish my wages and not hers. A call by me to the state more or less confirms that. They’ll go after me but she’s technically liable, too, since it was a joint return.
Here’s my points:
- She wanted half the 2004 refund when she thought there was a refund.
- She got half the federal return from 2007 even though we were separated and she didn’t earn any money that year either. She felt entitled to it.
- Despite her claims that she didn’t earn money in 2004, she lived as if she had income. For a women that didn’t have any income, she certainly had lots of out-go.
(I know that she’s, in part, responsible for part of the 2007 return even though she didn’t earn any income. Filing “Married-Joint” with her standard exemption, too, increased the return beyond the “Married-Separate” rate. I’m not arguing she didn’t have rights to part of that tax return).
I’ve offered to meet her halfway on this. If she’ll pay half the back taxes, about $375, I’ll cover the fees and interest myself - this acknowledges that I made the mistake that cost these extra fees but the tax bill is still a joint responsibility.
OK - that’s one half of this (tired yet?)
I just got called by a lawyer’s office looking for her. She ran out on a T-Mobile bill in 2004 (pre-divorce) for nearly $600 and they’re trying to collect.
I had my own cell phone and own bill during this time. She had a long habit of buying services, games, ring tones, etc even though I told her it was an expensive habit. She switched phones and plans whenever she wanted, frequently, often to hide from the fact that she paid her bills, let us say, somewhat inconsistently.
I feel no obligation to cover any part of her $600 bill from 2004 yet I still expect her to pay $375 toward the back taxes.
Am I being unreasonable here? I see the back-taxes as a past joint responsiblity but the cell-phone bill as a personal responsibility.
