I’ve just received a letter from the irs with a correction to my 2020 taxes. It requires a tax payment. This is my first time actually making a payment. Unfortunately I have no idea how to pay. I started creating an account with the irs ID me page, then I of course stumbled at the address and phone fields which only accept US data. Although they did send me a text to my Swiss number with a verification code at the beginning of the process.
How are you all paying? Which platform works for expats? I only have a brokerage account in the US. I thought a credit card would work.
Also, how are you figuring interest on the balance? Letter dated January from IRS arrives March. Payment due date in February. Oh joy.
Best bet is to join ACA which will allow you to open an account in the states at SDFCU. Then direct payment can be made. Also the mail from SDFCU can used to verify you with ID.me
It's easy to pay from your US account via a 3rd-party (approved by IRS and listed on their .gov website) facilitation site. I use my brokerage account to pay, and I use payusatax.com--it works fine. I was leery of giving a third party our account info, but I've never had any advertising or other negative effect. Does your brokerage account have a checking function? Mine does.
As to the interest, I would pay them the basic amount and let them come for the interest...yeah, good luck with their shortage of bodies!
The safest option to figure the interest is simply call them and ask what your current balance is (the phone number should be listed on the letter you received). Otherwise if you calculate it wrong, you could end up having to pay even more in penalties and interest afterwards
I don't think the ID me verification can work unless you have a US phone number. I called the IRS to complain about this and they said it was a work-in-progress for non-US residents, but wouldn't work now.
In terms of payment, you can use a credit card (plus a processing fee) or a bank transfer