A sum of more than $4.2 billion has been disbursed by the government to Americans by way of over 2.3 million stimulus checks.
Congress passed the American Rescue Plan Act in March 2021. Since then, nearly $395 billion has been disbursed through over 169 million payments. This legislation was passed for the benefit of families and individual persons who come under certain income categories and other criteria. A sum of $450 billion has been set aside for these relief payments and the amounts paid out so far total around 88% of it.
People falling under these criteria are authorized to receive up to $1,400 each as well as an additional $1,400 for every eligible dependent.
In this latest tranche of payments, over 1.2 million payments were made through direct deposits. The rest were sent by way of paper checks. Around 1.1 million of the most recent checks related to “plus-up” payments valued at over $2.5 billion. These were sent to families and individuals to whom payments were due after processing their 2020 tax returns.
In addition to this, around $1.9 billion paid out through over 900,000 checks was paid to people who did not have any previously recorded information but recently filed their IRS tax returns.
This is the third round of stimulus payments and it is estimated that around 159 million households are set to receive this money.
What to Do if I Miss a Payment?
In case you are eligible to receive this payment of $1,400 but have not received it yet, or the previous checks amounting to $1,200 and $600, file a federal tax return right away to claim your amounts.
This tax return will indicate whether your income has reduced since your last income tax return filing in 2019. This will make you eligible to receive these payouts. In case you have an additional dependent this year, that would also make you eligible.
The bonus payments for dependents can be claimed in regard to disabled adults, college students, and other adults who qualify as dependents. In the previous rounds, only children under the age of 17 years qualified as dependents for parents.
The IRS is continuing to pay stimulus checks every week to both people whose previous checks didn’t go through and to those who were not on its records earlier.
Who Gets a Stimulus Check?
Here are the various income categories that are eligible to get these stimulus checks:
- An individual filer earning up to $75,000 per annum will get the full amount of $1,400.
- Joint filers earning up to $150,000 will get the full amount of $2,800.
- Individual filers earning between $75,000 and $80,000 will get a reduced amount.
- Joint filers earning between $150,000 and $160,000 will get a reduced amount.
Individuals who don’t usually file tax returns such as rural sectors and homeless people are being encouraged to file their returns this year. Doing so would make them eligible to receive payments as well.
How to Track Your Payment?
You can track the status of your third stimulus check payment through the online tracking tool given by the IRS – Get My Payment. The online app works on phones, tablets, and desktops and you don’t have to download it from an app store. To access your check’s status, you need to provide the following information:
- Your Social Security Number or Individual Tax ID Number
- Your date of birth
- Your postal/mailing address
In case you get a message saying, “payment status is not available”, you may either not be eligible for the check or your payment may not have been processed yet by the IRS. If not, the tool will show when the deposit was made into which bank account or the date by which you can expect it to come.
