how to opt out of the new monthly child tax credit payments okay so if you are
someone who does not want an advance on your child tax credits maybe because
you're worried about the tax liability consequences or maybe you just like the
idea of having a big refund when you file your taxes then guess what you can opt out
because the irs just released a new tool on their website to help families manage
all of their child tax credit payments so in this video what i want to do is talk about
how you can opt out of those monthly payments how you can opt in like maybe you had a child in 2021
and you want to opt in for those credits i want to talk about how you can update your
status claims and a few more important updates so if that sounds good to you then stay tuned
hey there and welcome back to the channel i'm sean with life accounting the accounting
company that saves people from high taxes and low profits all right let's go ahead
and dive in now as a reminder there are several reasons why you may be automatically enrolled
in advanced child tax credit payment so it's up to you and you alone to make the decision to opt out
but sean why would i want to opt out i mean it's free money right well maybe let's go ahead and
talk about some reasons why you might want to opt out okay reason number one you are worried about
owing money next year when you file your 2021 taxes which is something that you would do in 2022
and this could be a legitimate reason because think about it you're getting an advance on your
child tax credit so technically you will have less credits to offset any tax liability that
you have when you file your 2021 tax return and if you already don't pay a lot of money
in taxes like you know you paid a bare minimum or you make a high income this could mean you end up
paying more in taxes when you file your return next year reason number two you may not qualify
for child tax credits listen i've seen this happen many times before okay you think you qualify you
meet all the requirements and then suddenly life happens okay you move to a new state you get a
new job suddenly your income increases and you no longer qualify for the same amount of credits that
you once did and then you wind up having to pay back all those advanced credits that you received
or in a reverse scenario you could lose your job and you don't support your child more than 50
so then someone else has the right to claim your kids as their dependents that would mean you have
to pay back any child tax credits you received or perhaps you decide to take a foreign job and
you end up out of the country for more than half of 2021 that's going to disqualify you
and then lastly maybe you have your own cynical reasons like the government is evil and there's
no way they're going to give you all that free money you're gonna have to pay it back the point
here is that even though you qualify today there are still six months left in the year and your
life could dramatically change and knock you out of receiving those monthly child tax credits so
if you are anticipating big changes that may be another reason to opt out and then lastly
reason number three you just want to get a big tax refund look i get it i've done taxes for nearly a
decade now and nearly all of my clients as soon as tax times comes want to maximize their tax
refund because maybe your tax refund is a way of you saving for a family vacation or maybe saving
up saving up for a big purchase like buying a new car or maybe you just like having a big lump sum
of cash in either case this is another big reason why so many people are considering to opt out of
receiving these monthly advanced child tax credit payments hey sean look i can opt out of this video
now of course i'm not going to opt out of making youtube videos i really enjoy doing this and so
if you're enjoying this video please hit that like button for the youtube algorithm it really
helps to spread this video around and supports our channel overall and it just makes us really happy
when you do that so please hit the like button and thank you for doing so so you have your reasons
let's go ahead and talk about how you do it so the irs has a new portal where families can go
and access a lot of things but the big thing right now is to be able to unroll or opt out
for advanced monthly child tax credits in 2021 so step number one you need to access the child text
credit update portal which in order to do so you must verify your identity all right and so if you
have an irs account or id dot me account really all you have to do is sign in and you're good but
of course if you do not have an irs account then make sure you sign up and verify your identity you
might have to provide like a photo identification such as a driver license or a government issued
id and they take that very seriously because the irs wants to prevent as much fraud as possible
and keep your money safe all right once you sign up step number two is go to the url i'm gonna
put it below here in this video and somewhere in the description and then once you get to
that link you're going to see a page that looks like this and you probably can tell what to do
from here right like click that blue unroll from events payments button and then fill out a form
to unroll now if you've been watching this and you're wondering how do i opt in then the process
will be very similar thing is right now the irs portal is still being developed so the opt-in
features are not available yet in fact the irs portal is going to be going through a number of
different updates that will allow families to be able to check the status of their payment like
being able to see has it hit their account yet you'll also be able to update your bank account
information which is something they promised it will start in august um you'll be able to update
your mailing address and you should be able to also update like your family status and your
income changes as well but for now remember you are automatically enrolled if you fail
a 2019 or 2020 tax return with the child tax credit you're also enrolled if you receive a prior
stimulus check for your child or you could be enrolled if you have a qualifying child under
the age of 18 years old and they have a valid social security number and remember you're
also automatically enrolled as long as your income is under a certain threshold and above
a certain threshold now if you want to learn a little bit more on exactly how to qualify for
the child tax credits then make sure you watch my video from a couple weeks ago where i break
it all down or check out koran's new video breaking down the frequently asked questions
on the child tax credit and get all the answers that you need and we'll see you over there