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Can I file jointly if wife lives out of country?

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mike777

Junior Member
What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? MA

My wife is now a student in Europe. Massachusetts requires that all MA residents prove they had health insurance coverage the entire year via the 1099-HC form. My wife was required to get health insurance in that other country, because a US plan is not accepted there. So, I did not have her on my MA insurance policy (that would be both redundant and unusable).

But, now I have no way to prove she had health insurance. There is no way I can get a 1099-HC sent to me for an out of country plan. I am going to get socked with severe penalties if I don't figure out what to do.

Can I file jointly but say she lives at another (out of country) address? I don't want to file separately in order to be able to enter two different addresses, because then I'll have to pay something like $6000 more in taxes, plus penalties. The tax form only shows a place for one address. I'm not sure what to do!What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)?
 


LdiJ

Senior Member
What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? MA

My wife is now a student in Europe. Massachusetts requires that all MA residents prove they had health insurance coverage the entire year via the 1099-HC form. My wife was required to get health insurance in that other country, because a US plan is not accepted there. So, I did not have her on my MA insurance policy (that would be both redundant and unusable).

But, now I have no way to prove she had health insurance. There is no way I can get a 1099-HC sent to me for an out of country plan. I am going to get socked with severe penalties if I don't figure out what to do.

Can I file jointly but say she lives at another (out of country) address? I don't want to file separately in order to be able to enter two different addresses, because then I'll have to pay something like $6000 more in taxes, plus penalties. The tax form only shows a place for one address. I'm not sure what to do!What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)?
That is an extremely state specific question and I don't think that we have any tax professionals here from MA. I would recommend contacting a MA tax professional to get your question answered.

What I would guess is that you would need to mail in your MA return with proof of your wife's coverage in Europe.
 

mike777

Junior Member
Nothing that I've read about the MA law indicates that I would have any hope of getting them to approve the plan. The law requires that the MA insurance providers go through a process to get their plan approved, and only those plans are allowed for avoiding the lack of insurance penalty. A company in another country isn't going to go through the MA approval process.

So, that's why I'm hoping I can just say she doesn't live here, so that it becomes a non-issue. Is it possible to live apart but still file jointly? We are still really married, not separated (except by distance) or anything. My wife does not work, so I need the tax deduction benefit by filing with her.

So, can that type of filing at least be done on the federal level?
 

mike777

Junior Member
A brief update: Even though the benefit enrollment period had passed for next year, I managed to call them up and add her back to the health insurance plan. That'll be an extra $200 a month but it is better than paying penalties that will probably approach that amount per month. (And it is way better than filing separately... I just remembered about AMT that I'd have to pay if filing separately, so I could easily lose as much as $10,000 there, not sure on the exact figure.)
 

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