Well, actually not directly anyway. I didn’t know about this before today:
Nearly a year ago, The Motley Fool published an article titled “You’re still paying for the Spanish-American War,” which noted that, bizarre though it may be, we’ve all been socked on each phone bill with an excise tax that went into effect long ago to pay for the Spanish-American War. Well, sometimes our friends in Washington do something right. The tax has indeed finally come to an end, and we’re even being offered refunds.
The money is out there for you — you just have to jump through a few hoops in order to get it.
Here are a few things to know, courtesy of Dick Hansen at refundphonetax.com and also from the Internal Revenue Service:
You are to claim the refund on the 2006 tax form that you file in 2007.
You can opt for a standard refund of $30 (if you have one exemption), $40 (if you have two), $50 (if you have three) or $60 (if you have more). This option requires no documentation from you.
If you have (or want to go through the trouble of procuring) your telephone bill statements from March 2003 to July 2006, you can get a refund based on amounts you were actually charged. In most cases, this can amount to a lot more than the standard refund — perhaps as much as $100 to $300 for many of us. You’ll need to fill out IRS Form 8913 for this.
If this is the first time you’ve heard of this, you’re morally obligated to use a portion of the refund to buy one, two, maybe even three, copies of Frank’s book. I would recommend you buy a copy with your own money, but I haven’t read it because Frank hasn’t sent me a gratis copy yet–cheap S.O.B.