Here's What You Need to Remember: “Yes, expats qualify for the third stimulus check. You qualify if you fall within the income threshold, have a social security number, and file taxes — even if you live overseas,”

The United States is wrapping up its distribution of the stimulus checks from the American Rescue Plan. As the IRS’ last report nearly two weeks ago, 165 million payments had been sent out over the course of nine weeks, with a total value of $388 billion. That’s out of the $410 billion allocated for such payments when the American Rescue Plan was passed in March.

What can you do if you didn’t receive your stimulus payment yet? Among those asking that question are Americans living abroad, who retain their American citizenship despite living in another country.

“If you are a U.S. citizen or resident alien, the rules for filing income, estate, and gift tax returns and paying estimated tax are generally the same whether you are in the United States or abroad. Your worldwide income is subject to U.S. income tax, regardless of where you reside,” the IRS says on its website. “If you are a U.S. citizen or resident alien residing overseas, or are in the military on duty outside the U.S., on the regular due date of your return, you are allowed an automatic 2-month extension to file your return without requesting an extension. For a calendar year return, the automatic 2-month extension is to June 15.

As for questions about stimulus specifically, H&R Block answered some questions recently.

“Yes, expats qualify for the third stimulus check. You qualify if you fall within the income threshold, have a social security number, and file taxes — even if you live overseas,” the company said. This applies to U.S. citizens living abroad, families with non-resident aliens or mixed U.S. citizenship, and “U.S. expat retirees, SSDI, and other expat non-filers.”

“Retired expats may qualify for the third stimulus check even if they aren’t required to file a tax return each year,” H&R Block said in the blog post. “This also applies to Social Security beneficiaries (both retirement and disability), railroad retirees, and those receiving veteran’s benefits. If you do not receive Social Security retirement benefits, railroad benefits, Social Security Disability Insurance, or veteran’s benefits through the government and you haven’t filed a 2019 or 2020 tax return, you may need to take action to get your payment.”

In late 2020, the IRS admitted that an error caused it to accidentally send $1,200 stimulus checks to some non-Americans living overseas, NPR reported at the time. The IRS had at first claimed that these people were themselves to blame for incorrectly filing their taxes, but the agency ultimately admitted that they, not the taxpayers, had been responsible for those errors.

Stephen Silver, a technology writer for The National Interest, is a journalist, essayist and film critic, who is also a contributor to The Philadelphia Inquirer, Philly Voice, Philadelphia Weekly, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Living Life Fearless, Backstage magazine, Broad Street Review and Splice Today. The co-founder of the Philadelphia Film Critics Circle, Stephen lives in suburban Philadelphia with his wife and two sons. Follow him on Twitter at @StephenSilver. This article first appeared earlier this year.

Image: Reuters.