The Date on the Letter

The letter is not a bill. It is a door, and it closes on a date printed on the first page.

A notice of deficiency arrives by certified mail. There is a number in it larger than you expected, and almost nobody understands what they are actually holding.

It is not a demand for payment. Nothing has been assessed yet. It is the only document that gets you into the United States Tax Court, which is the only court in the country that will consider whether you owe the money before you have to pay it.

File a two-page petition by the date on the letter and section 6213(a) bars the IRS from assessing or collecting while your case runs. The filing fee is sixty dollars and it can be waived. You do not need an attorney. Most of these cases settle with IRS Appeals and never see a courtroom.

Miss that date and you can still argue, but only after paying in full.

This book is the whole procedure, in plain English:

• Why ninety days is never really ninety days, and why calling the IRS does not stop the clock
• The safe harbor written into the statute that makes the printed date the one that counts
• Filing online or by mail, and the postmark rule that protects paper filers
• The petition itself, with worked examples of what to actually write
• The small tax case election, what it gives you and the appeal right it takes away
• IRS Appeals, where most of these cases are really decided
• The honest list of what remains if the deadline has already passed
• Old addresses, joint returns, unfiled years, stolen Social Security numbers, living abroad, and what happens when the court is shut
• Free help that is genuinely free, and how to tell it from the companies that call you

Every rule is quoted from the Internal Revenue Code and every procedural detail comes from the Tax Court's own published pages. No firm to hire. Nothing to buy.

Information about procedure, not tax or legal advice. Federal law as at September 2026.