The money is continuing to flow out as a result of the American Rescue Plan and this week saw tens of millions of new payments hit banks and the post office. If you are someone looking for a stimulus check, here is what you should look for.
37 Millions New Stimulus Payments Went Out
The IRS provided this breakdown of the latest round of stimulus payments that went out on Wednesday. 17 million payments went in the form of direct deposit (totaling nearly $83 billion) while 15 million paper checks went out (a total of $34 billion) and 5 million prepaid debit cards have been sent (with a value of $11 billion).
How Will You Get Your Money?
If you have filed a return in 2019 or 2020 (or if you had received the previous money via direct deposit) and you put your direct deposit information on your return, you can expect to receive your portion of the stimulus money via direct deposit. While the majority of money going out this way already has, there are still many people to receive money this way.
If you did not have your bank account information on your return or you did not have a return filed for 2019 or 2020, you will be receiving your money through the mail. The question is how will you receive it? Some people will be receiving it on a check while others (5 million people will receive money in this batch in a prepaid debit card) will receive it a on a prepaid debit card.
What to Look for in the Mail
So, this is what you need to look for if you are getting a prepaid debit card.
The Visa debit cards are issued by MetaBank.
A sample image of the envelope that will be delivering your stimulus debit card
The check will be a normal check from the IRS.
Track Your Payment
Now that you know how the money is going out, the next step is finding out how your payment is/did go out. The trick for that is going to the IRS Get My Payment website. This will give you all the information about how your payment was made and when it went out.
To find out for sure, click this link to go to the IRS status tool. What you will need is your social security number, your birthdate, your address, and zip code. Right after entering that, it will give you a status message about your money. Below is what I saw with my status.
Status Messages
If you do not see it saying that the money will be deposited, you can check back each day as this tool is updated once per day. It will tell you if the money has been scheduled for deposit, a check sent out, or a debit card sent. If you do not recognize the bank account number shown, you will have to wait a little longer. The money will bounce back and you will eventually be issued a check or prepaid debit card.
Remember that the tool above will not let you make any changes to how you receive your payment. So, what the IRS has on file will be what they attempt to send it to.
Payment Status:
- A payment has been processed, a payment date is available and payment is to be sent either by direct deposit or mail. Note: mail means you may be issued an EIP Card or a check.
or
- You’re eligible, but a payment has not been processed and a payment date is not yet available.
It will not show the amount of your 2021 Economic Impact Payment.
Payment Status Not Available: We haven’t yet processed your payment oryou’re not eligible for a payment.
Need More Information: Your payment was returned to the IRS because the Postal Service was unable to deliver it. Only people who get this message can use the tool to give us bank account information.
Get help with this tool in Get My Payment Frequently Asked Questions.
Track Your Payment in the Mail
If you see that your stimulus payment was sent out as a check or debit card, the next step is to set it up to track your money through the USPS. They have a handy tool that makes this easy.
Sign-up for the USPS Informed Delivery system
Link: Sign-Up for the Free Informed Delivery by USPS
While the Get My Payment tool can tell you when a check was mailed, it does not give you a delivery date. Also, there are some people that have had their checks stolen out of their mailboxes.
This great USPS tool is called Informed Delivery by USPS. This is a free service that you can setup that will send you an e-mail each weekday morning with the mail that you will be receiving. It delivers electronically a greyscale image of the front of each envelope that is set to be delivered to you.
Get a scan of all your mail to be delivered
This is accomplished through the automated scanning equipment the USPS uses for mail processing. Any mail that would go through this automated process will be sent as an image to your e-mail.
You can sign-up easily enough and verify your identity. But, it will take 3 business days for this process to be complete so if you do it today, you likely won’t have any notifications delivered before Wednesday or Thursday.
How Much Will Your Check Be For?
Bottom Line
While hundreds of millions of dollars have already been sent out, there are still millions to go. 37 million new stimulus payments went out this week. If you were still waiting on yours, these tips and tools above should help you figure out how much to expect and how you will receive it.
