What to do if you receive a notice from the SCDOR

The South Carolina Department of Revenue (SCDOR) sends thousands of notices each year, particularly during or after tax season to help process a return or to collect taxes owed.

If you receive a notice from the SCDOR, read it thoroughly and as soon as possible. Failure to read and act upon some notices can result in additional penalties or interest on an assessment.

Here are three of the most common SCDOR notices:

• Notice of Refund Adjustment. This notice can be triggered by not filling out a return correctly or as the result of an audit. You may also receive it if your refund is being offset to pay a tax debt or debt owed to another agency.
• Notice of Assessment. This is your tax bill. This bill could be the result of only making a partial payment when you filed, or because you owe additional tax, penalty, or interest. You can pay your bill online, or you may be eligible to set up a payment plan.
•  Notice of Levy on Wages, Salary. This notice means you owe a tax debt and the State is going to garnish your wages until the debt is cleared. Levies are issued if you don’t respond to our requests to make timely payments or set up a payment plan.

Other examples of notices include:

• Notice of Proposed Adjustment
• Notice of Tax Lien
• Notice Before Collection
• Estimated Assessment Notice
• Collection Fee Notice
• ID Verification Notice

The title and body of the notice explain its purpose and spell out exactly what you need to do to satisfy the requirements of the notice and what can happen if you ignore those requirements.

To ensure you can reach an SCDOR representative, each notice provides agency contact information. If a representative or specific division sent the notice, their contact information should be on the lower left-hand side of the notice.

If someone other than the notice recipient needs to discuss the notice with the SCDOR, they must have a valid power of attorney on file with the agency before talking to an SCDOR representative.

For more information on SCDOR notices, visit the SCDOR’s website.