Recovery of Erroneously Withheld Additional Medicare Tax

Dec 22, 2018 3 Replies

Due to the Tax Reform Act having significantly reduced federal tax withheld for a given number of withholding exemptions, I decided to change my W-4 withholding category from Married to Single, in order to withhold a sufficient amount of tax.



Consequently, my last pay stub of the year went over $200k of Medicare income, and having checked Single on W-4, my employer withheld some Additional Medicare Tax.



Because I will file Married Jointly, I am not subject to Additional Medicare Tax as my income is less than $250k.



I looked at Form 8959, but don't see where/how I can claim a refund of this additional Medicare tax withheld.



Meanwhile, I did just change my W-4 to check the box, Married, but withhold at higher Single rate.



Please advise what I can do to recover the additional Medicare tax that was withheld.


File your taxes in the normal way at the normal time.

Federal withholding payments all go into one account that is credited against the total taxes you owe. If the total you've paid is more than the total you owe on your form 1040, you can get a refund or credit it to next year's tax.

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If you complete each section of the 8959 that is relevant for you, you will discover that when you get to the bottom (Part V) you have on Line

24 excess withholding. It tells you to add that amount to your federal income tax withholding and place the total on Line 16 of the 1040.

E.g., if you weren't a railroad worker and you had no self-employment income, you would complete Parts I, IV and V.

This isn't Medicare related, but when I want additional withholding I don't muck around with filing status or number of exemptions. I simply write in the extra amount on the line provided for that purpose.

General question: Is there a free and good-quality withholding calculator somewhere, where you put in your filing status and salary and the amount you want withheld, and it tells you how many exemptions to claim?

(I've found several calculators, including the IRS's own, but they all make assumptions that don't necessarily apply to me. And none of them seem to account for the receipt of Social Security benefits while I'm working, which obviously requires increased withholding.)

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