Frequently Asked Questions for Debtors in the Treasury Offset Program
The questions on this webpage are about the Treasury Offset Program (TOP), the program that withholds money to pay for delinquent debts. To understand more about TOP, see How TOP Works.
What is the Treasury Offset Program?
Your payment may be less than you expected because you owed an overdue debt to a federal or state agency. If that is the case, you should have received a letter explaining what happened.
Treasury may withhold money to satisfy an overdue (delinquent) debt. The official term for withholding money from a payment is “offset” or, for a federal tax debt, “levy.”
The program that offsets or levies payments for overdue debts is the Treasury Offset Program (TOP).
To understand more about TOP, see How TOP Works .
If you owe an overdue debt to a federal or state agency, the agency sends information about your debt to the TOP database. Payments made by federal (and certain state) agencies are automatically matched against the database to see if you owe an overdue debt. If your debt is in the database, we hold back money from the payment to pay your debt. When we take money from your payment, we send you a letter explaining what we did.
Our Quick Reference Chart on the Treasury Offset Program provides a general list of payments subject to offset, including by what percentage those payments can be offset.
Depending on the type of debt you owe, examples of payments that TOP can offset include:
- Tax refunds
- Wages, including military pay
- Retirement, including military retirement pay and OPM annuity payments
- Contractor or vendor payments
- Travel advances and reimbursements
- Some federal benefit payments, including Black Lung (Part B) benefits, Railroad Retirement benefits (except Tier 2), and Social Security benefits (except Supplemental Security Income)
- Other federal payments, unless the payment has been exempted, as listed on this chart.
- Some state payments
Your information can be sent to TOP when you have not paid money you owe to a federal or state agency on time. Before sending your information to TOP, the agency must determine that your debt is valid and legally enforceable and provide you with notification of their intent to collect the debt through offset.
Before an agency refers a debt to us, the agency must send you a letter. The letter must tell you:
- What the debt is for
- How much you owe
- That the agency intends to collect the debt by taking money from a federal payment; and
- What your rights are, including your rights to see, copy, and review information about the debt, and the ways you can arrange to repay the debt
If TOP takes money from a payment to pay an overdue debt that you owe, you will get a letter notifying you of the offset.
You may also find information about debts that have been referred to TOP or payments that have been offset by calling the TOP Interactive Voice Response (IVR) at 800-304-3107. Hearing impaired customers may use the Federal Relay Service by dialing 800-877-8339 to reach a Communications Assistant who will dial the toll-free number.
The taxpayer identification number or “TIN” is used to identify entities liable for debt referred to TOP. Any payment to an entity using the same TIN as the entity that has been referred to TOP is eligible for offset or levy to collect the referred debt.
TOP cannot accept payments on the debt. You may contact the program/agency that referred your debt to TOP. Usually, this is either the Cross-Servicing program or the agency to which you owe the debt. You can work with that agency/program to pay or otherwise resolve the debt.
If you don’t know what program/agency referred your debt to TOP, you may call the TOP Interactive Voice Response (IVR) at 800-304-3107. Hearing impaired customers may use the Federal Relay Service by dialing 800-877-8339 to reach a Communications Assistant who will dial the toll-free number.
If IRS has served a levy on the Bureau of the Fiscal Service through TOP, Fiscal Service will levy eligible payments made to the debtor on behalf of IRS.
The Internal Revenue Code generally prohibits Fiscal Service from disclosing any information about the tax debt, including that it exists or that a levy to collect the debt was the reason for a payment being reduced (or for a FedWire payment being blocked). But, when Fiscal Service levies a payment, it generally will send a notice to the debtor/payee at the time of the levy. If you believe you owe a federal tax debt, you may contact the IRS at 800-829-1040 to learn more.
What do I do if I think there was a mistake?
TOP staff cannot discuss your debt with you, refund any amounts collected, or discuss payment options with you. If you have questions or need help, you may contact the program/agency that is servicing your debt. Usually, that is either the agency to which you owe the debt or the Cross-Servicing program.
If you don’t know what program/agency is servicing your debt, call the TOP Interactive Voice Response system: 800-304-3107. Hearing impaired customers may use the Federal Relay Service by dialing 800-877-8339 to reach a Communications Assistant who will dial the toll-free number.
Get IRS Form 8379 or call the IRS at 800-829-3676. For help with the form or other questions, you may contact the IRS at 800-829-1040 or call your local IRS office.
There can be lag times of two weeks or more between when an offset is taken and when the agency collecting the debt gets and processes the collection.
For example, for child support debts, we send the amounts we collect to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Office of Child-Support Services. They send the money to the states. To find out about a specific payment, you may ask your state child-support enforcement office to contact HHS.
I was supposed to get a payment by FedWire, but the payment was blocked.
TOP will only offset a payment up to the amount of the debt balance. Some payments, especially those for larger amounts, are sent by a service called FedWire. FedWire is often used when payments must be applied and credited immediately on receipt. Because of operational constraints, FedWire payments are not matched against TOP. So, FedWire payments may not be made when the person who is entitled to payment owes a debt in TOP, meaning that any attempted FedWire payment to a TOP debtor is blocked. At the direction of the creditor agency, TOP will remove the FedWire block the day after a debt is fully paid or otherwise resolved.
When an attempted FedWire payment is blocked, the payment agency may decide to send the payment through the automated clearing house (ACH). ACH payments are matched through TOP, so the payment can be offset up to the amount of the debt and any amount remaining after the offset(s) will be disbursed to the payee.
You may contact the program/agency that referred your debt to TOP. Usually, this is either the Cross-Servicing program or the agency to which you owe the debt. You can work with that agency/program to pay or otherwise resolve the debt. If the debt is fully paid, it will no longer be active in TOP and the FedWire block will be removed.
You may also contact the payment agency and ask them to disburse the payment through ACH. ACH payments settle the day after the payment is disbursed. ACH payments can be offset through TOP, meaning that if the delinquent debt is still active in TOP, the ACH payment may be offset for up to the full amount of the debt.
How can the Treasury Offset Program help me?
The law lets states collect overdue child support from some types of federal payments.
Contact your state or local child-support enforcement office to find out whether TOP can offset your ex-spouse's federal payments for the overdue child support your ex-spouse owes.
For more information, you can also contact the HHS' Office of Child-Support Services at 202-401-9373.
Yes, TOP helps states in the collection of debts owed to states in several ways. To learn more, visit How TOP Collects Money for State Agencies.