Waiting for Your Stimulus Check in the Mail? Here Is What To Look For.

Waiting for Your Stimulus Check in the Mail? Here Is What To Look For.

To help prepare Americans waiting for that physical check, the IRS has released new images of what they should be on the lookout for in the mail this time—and it will prominently show the seal of the U.S. Treasury on the envelope.

Earlier this week, the Internal Revenue Service and U.S. Treasury announced that roughly a hundred million more stimulus checks—totaling more than $420 billion—are headed to financially struggling Americans through direct deposit and traditional mail over the course of the next several weeks.

For this particular batch of Economic Impact Payments under the American Rescue Plan, what’s noticeably different is that it includes a large number of paper checks and prepaid debit cards.

“The IRS continues to send the third round of stimulus payments in record time,” IRS Commissioner Chuck Rettig said in a statement.

“Since this new set of payments will include more mailed payments, we urge people to carefully watch their mail for a check or debit card in the coming weeks,” he added.

Be aware that there have been reports that in the previous rounds of stimulus payments, some people mistook their mailed payments for junk mail and threw them out with the trash.

To help prepare Americans waiting for that physical check, the IRS has released new images of what they should be on the lookout for in the mail this time—and it will prominently show the seal of the U.S. Treasury on the envelope.

Also, keep in mind that the paper checks will not bear President Joe Biden’s signature, though previous payments had former President Donald Trump’s name on it.

Meanwhile, some people should be on the lookout for a prepaid debit card. Know that debit cards that were used for previous payments will not be reloaded, so if you’re eligible, a new one will be issued. The debit cards will have the Visa name on the front and MetaBank N.A., which issues the cards, on the back.

The Treasury also noted that if a taxpayer received the last two stimulus checks in the mail, he or she could get the payment as a direct deposit this time around.

“The vast majority of taxpayers receiving EIPs will receive it by direct deposit. In addition, the IRS and the Bureau of the Fiscal Service leveraged data in their systems to convert many payments to direct deposits that otherwise would have been sent as paper checks or debit cards,” the agency said.

“This accelerated the disbursement of these payments by weeks.”

If you’re still waiting for your check after this week, know that you can always log on to the IRS “Get My Payment” tool at www.irs.gov/coronavirus/get-my-payment. To use it, you will just need to enter your full Social Security or tax ID number, date of birth, street address, and ZIP code.

Also, take note that fewer Americans will receive stimulus payments this time around, so make sure to confirm if you even qualify. Individuals who earn as much as $75,000 in adjusted gross income (AGI), or couples making $150,000—in addition to their children or adult dependents—qualify for the full $1,400 per individual.

Ethen Kim Lieser is a Minneapolis-based Science and Tech Editor who has held posts at Google, The Korea Herald, Lincoln Journal Star, AsianWeek, and Arirang TV. Follow or contact him on LinkedIn.