# Paying taxes to IRS



## james4beach (Nov 15, 2012)

Does anyone here have experience making IRS tax payments from Canada? I'm doing my US taxes now and will have about 1,000 - 2,000 owing.

I realize that if one has a US bank account, one can pay the IRS directly. However my stash of USD is sitting in a Canadian brokerage (in TDB8152). One thought I had is that I could pay the taxes using my TD US dollar credit card. The IRS appears to allow credit card payments:
https://www.irs.gov/payments/pay-your-taxes-by-debit-or-credit-card

This would incur roughly a $30 credit card fee, which is likely cheaper than wiring money into the US. Seems easier as well, plus I can then pay off my credit card using my USD cash without any further conversions.

Has anyone here paid US taxes by credit card? Is there a better way, considering that I have a US bank account but insufficient cash in it?


----------



## Mukhang pera (Feb 26, 2016)

Never paid by credit card. For years I have simply paid by check drawn on my US bank account, although my California income tax I can pay online by debit.

But thanks for the link to the IRS website. It shows that debit card payments are okay, for a small fee. The fee is less than postage from Canada and one does not having to worry about a payment being lost in the mail.


----------



## gardner (Feb 13, 2014)

This "where to file" page seems to imply that you can send them a cheque or draft to Charlotte.
https://www.irs.gov/filing/internat...addresses-for-taxpayers-and-tax-professionals


----------



## james4beach (Nov 15, 2012)

Mukhang pera said:


> Never paid by credit card. For years I have simply paid by check drawn on my US bank account, although my California income tax I can pay online by debit.
> 
> But thanks for the link to the IRS website. It shows that debit card payments are okay, for a small fee. The fee is less than postage from Canada and one does not having to worry about a payment being lost in the mail.


OK, but your checks, or your debit card, are US-based right? These are drawn on your US bank account.


----------



## james4beach (Nov 15, 2012)

gardner said:


> This "where to file" page seems to imply that you can send them a cheque or draft to Charlotte.
> https://www.irs.gov/filing/internat...addresses-for-taxpayers-and-tax-professionals


I'm sure they would accept US checks, but what if my bank is in Canada? I do have USD denominated cheques from TD, but they aren't coded like domestic US cheques. They are foreign cheques and I once tried depositing one in the US... the bank added a hefty fee.

Maybe I should phone the IRS and ask if they would accept my USD cheque drawn on a Canadian bank (foreign cheque)


----------



## Mukhang pera (Feb 26, 2016)

james4beach said:


> OK, but your checks, or your debit card, are US-based right? These are drawn on your US bank account.


Yes, you are right. Both are US-based.

However, I had an occasion about a year ago where, like you, the money in my US account was insufficient to pay the amount owed, which was $8,800 US. So I wrote a check on my RBC account in Vancouver. I wrote the amount as "$8,800 U.S.". The IRS cashed it. It showed up on my bank statement as 3 entries back to back under the heading "Withdrawals". The first was for a check of $8,800. For a moment I thought RBC had charged me in Canadian funds, which would have been nice. Then I realized that the entry following, for $2,298, was the exchange amount they charged on $8,800. Then came a $20 service fee. So I paid CAD11,118 to pay the IRS USD8,800. Not sure what the exchange rate was at the time, but I am pretty sure I got hosed. So I don't recommend paying from a Canadian funds account, stipulating for payment in US funds.


----------



## james4beach (Nov 15, 2012)

Interesting. For my TD US dollar account, I actually have printed cheques. They are denominated in USD but they are electronically coded using the Canadian format, and not the US format. (Domestic US checks use a 9 digit "routing number" and these TD Canada Trust checks don't have that)

I wonder what would happen if I send one of these to the IRS. They can be deposited in the US, but are foreign to them... despite being in USD.

Worth a shot maybe? I would hate for it to be rejected and still have amounts oweing.


----------



## james4beach (Nov 15, 2012)

lol. I phoned the IRS, waited on hold for half an hour, then <click> they hung up on me. That happens to me pretty often with American-based call centers.


----------



## Mukhang pera (Feb 26, 2016)

james4beach said:


> Interesting. For my TD US dollar account, I actually have printed cheques. They are denominated in USD but they are electronically coded using the Canadian format, and not the US format. (Domestic US checks use a 9 digit "routing number" and these TD Canada Trust checks don't have that)
> 
> I wonder what would happen if I send one of these to the IRS. They can be deposited in the US, but are foreign to them... despite being in USD.
> 
> Worth a shot maybe? I would hate for it to be rejected and still have amounts oweing.


I just looked at my checks. The RBC checks have no routing number. My B of A checks have the 9-digit number, just as you say. I know that the IRS managed to negotiate my RBC check at about this time last year with no problem, although I think RBC mulcted me in exchange charges.


----------



## james4beach (Nov 15, 2012)

Amazing, I reached an agent. Only waited 5 minutes on the phone. He was pretty helpful and he says that while the instructions do not specify domestic vs foreign cheques, his guidance was: don't send a foreign cheque.

It sounds like the IRS was able to deposit your foreign (RBC) cheque though.


----------



## gardner (Feb 13, 2014)

TD will write me a bank draft for $10. I'm not sure if a $US bank draft is any more acceptable to the IRS than a personal cheque. Last I looked their $US drafts were drawn on a US daughter institution with a US address and so forth -- presumably with US style account info.


----------



## Mukhang pera (Feb 26, 2016)

james4beach said:


> Amazing, I reached an agent. Only waited 5 minutes on the phone. He was pretty helpful and he says that while the instructions do not specify domestic vs foreign cheques, his guidance was: don't send a foreign cheque.
> 
> It sounds like the IRS was able to deposit your foreign (RBC) cheque though.


My guess is that domestic checks are preferred, while some others might pass muster. It may also be the case that there are foreign checks and _foreign_ checks. For example, a few years ago, Koogie wrote of one of the world's more obscure countries known as "Outer Bumfuckistan". Perhaps the IRS would take a more kindly view to a check drawn on a major Canadian bank than, say, the Coconut Planters Bank of Outer Bumfuckistan.


----------



## gardner (Feb 13, 2014)

Mukhang pera said:


> there are foreign checks and _foreign_ checks.


It's all Soviet Canuckistan to the Americans.


----------



## smihaila (Apr 6, 2009)

james4beach,

More ideas:
- An Amerifriend could help
- Find a way to do an ACH transfer?
- Maybe IRS can accept a payment via USPS money order that you could buy with a US-denominated Credit Card?
- If you're still having a US-established brokerage account (maybe through Fidelity), you could transfer US funds from Canadian Fidelity to US Fidelity and provide IRS with your Fidelity Cash sub-account number?
- TD cross-border to move funds to a TD.com checking account that you could open remotely pretty quickly (there is one that doesn't charge fees if you keep US $100).


----------



## james4beach (Nov 15, 2012)

I think I can get enough funds into my US bank account, which will make things easier.

Then it should be possible to use the debit card method that Mukhang pera mentioned.

There's another interesting method, if paying out of a US account (an account which has US routing numbers). They have something called Direct Pay, which does not use third parties, no fee. I think it just pulls money out of the bank account.


----------



## smihaila (Apr 6, 2009)

Yup, I think something similar to Direct Pay is actually used, when you enter a US account that has a US routing number, directly on the tax return.
That's how I did (via TurboTax) and the payment was processed smoothly and quickly.


----------

