Hi,

I am staying with my wife and kid from March'2007 till Oct'2007 end. My wife and kid will be going back to India and will never come back to US again.
I have some question about return filling for year 2007, which I will be doing some where in Feb'2008.

- Do I will be filling jointly even though my wife is in India (but for 6 months they were with me in USA)
- Can I notorize photocopy of my wife and kid passport by some Indian magistrate or lawyer
- Do I need to take photocopy of entire passport or only first, last and visa pages only
- Since I cannot do return filing online, how I will know about deduction and other requirement. Is their any guidelines about what are all to fill so that I calculate tax withholding correctly.
- If my project gets over and I need to do return filling from India, then how should I do all this process of getting ITIN, notorizing passport copies of dependent and manually filling returns.

Please help me in knowing this,

Thanks in advance

Prakash

1) Yes, you can file jointly IF you are eligible to file as a resident alien. Your wife's physical location is irrelevant.

2) Only as a last resort. The IRS prefers U.S. notorization or, preferably, certification by an local IRS office. Get this done BEFORE your wife and child leaves.

3) Entire passport.

4) If you cannot file on-line, I recommend you get professional tax help. Contact me at the email address below for details and fees, as Indian businessmen and workers are a speciality of mine.

5) Get the passport notarized/certified BEFORE you leave the U.S. or you will have to have it done at a U.S. consulate.