One Taxpayer’s Identity Theft Saga – Part 4

NOTE: I wrote this post in 2012, so be aware of its age. 

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This is the story of Wendy Boka’s saga with identity theft and the IRS. Her husband Brian died in January 2010 and someone stole his identity and filed a fraudulent tax return in his name. We’re still trying to get the IRS to sort this mess out — all these months later.

The names are real and are used with Wendy’s permission.

You can find out more about Wendy at her blog, http://www.wendyrebuilding.blogspot.com/.

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Read the previous parts of this story: Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3.

The person I talked to at the IRS in mid-May was confused about what was going on. I had to explain (again!) about the identity theft, that it was Brian’s identity that had been stolen but that he had died and the notices were being sent to his surviving spouse, Wendy. This seemed to boggle the mind of the IRS representative. They couldn’t understand why I was calling on behalf of Wendy when it was Brian’s identity that had been stolen.

After a ridiculous amount of re-explaining everything I had told them at least three times before, the collections department agreed to place another 60-day hold on further collection actions against Wendy.

I was told — again — to call in 60 days and “update them on what’s going on.” And again, I was told to call before the 60 days were up if we heard anything from the identity theft unit.

Of course, the 60 days came and went with nothing happening. There was another phone call with the IRS in July, which I’ll talk about in Part 6, but still no resolution. So to summarize: Brian died in January of 2010. Wendy moved to Texas that year to try to rebuild her life. And here we are, almost 31 months later, and Wendy still has no official closure because of this mess.