You found out in the worst possible way. Maybe your boss called you into the office. Maybe HR sent you an email. Maybe you found out when your paycheck was a fraction of what it should have been.
The IRS has contacted your employer and is about to — or already has — started taking most of your wages before you ever see them.
This is called an IRS wage levy, and it is one of the most financially devastating things that can happen to a working person. But it can be stopped. Here’s what you need to know.
What Is an IRS Wage Levy (Garnishment)?
When the IRS determines you owe a tax debt and collection efforts haven’t succeeded, they can issue a continuous wage levy — a legal order sent directly to your employer requiring them to withhold a portion of your paycheck and send it to the IRS every single pay period.
Your employer has no choice. They are legally required to comply or face their own penalties.
Unlike a bank levy — which is a one-time seizure of whatever is in your account on that day — a wage levy is continuous. It hits every paycheck, automatically, until the IRS releases it or the debt is paid in full.
How Much Will the IRS Take?
This is the part that shocks most people.
The IRS uses a formula based on your filing status and number of dependents to calculate a small “exempt amount” — the portion of your paycheck you are allowed to keep. Everything above that exempt amount goes to the IRS.
For most people, this means keeping somewhere between $200 and $500 per paycheck — regardless of what you actually earn or what your bills actually are.
Think about that. Rent. Car payment. Utilities. Groceries. Insurance. All of that — on whatever the IRS formula decides you can keep.
It is designed to create urgency. And it does.
What Your Employer Has to Do
Once your employer receives the levy notice, they are required to:
- Calculate the exempt amount based on the information you provide them
- Withhold everything above that exempt amount from each paycheck
- Send the withheld funds directly to the IRS every pay period
- Continue doing this until they receive a levy release from the IRS
There is no grace period. There is no negotiation with your employer. The levy takes effect immediately.
And here is something many people worry about: Can your employer fire you over this?
Federal law provides some protection against termination for a first garnishment. However, that protection has limits — and the embarrassment and awkwardness of having your employer involved in your IRS problem is real. The faster this is resolved, the better.
How to Stop an IRS Wage Garnishment
A wage garnishment can be released. Here is how it happens:
Option 1: Enter into an approved installment agreement – If you agree to pay your tax debt in regular monthly installments, the IRS will typically release the wage levy. The amount of the payment must be acceptable to the IRS based on your financial situation.
Option 2: Offer in Compromise If you qualify for an Offer in Compromise — a settlement of your debt for less than the full amount — the IRS will release the levy while the offer is being reviewed.
Option 3: Demonstrate financial hardship – If the levy is preventing you from meeting your basic living expenses — housing, food, utilities, transportation to work — the IRS is required to consider releasing it on hardship grounds. This requires documentation and a formal request.
Option 4: Currently Not Collectible status – If your financial situation is severe enough, the IRS may place your account in “currently not collectible” status, which stops all collection activity, including the wage levy.
Option 5: Challenge the levy – In some cases, a levy can be challenged if proper notice was not given, if the collection statute of limitations has expired, or if there is a dispute about the underlying debt itself.
The right option depends on your specific situation — your income, your expenses, the amount you owe, and your history with the IRS. An experienced tax attorney will analyze all of these factors and pursue the fastest path to a release.
Time Matters More Than You Think
Every paycheck that passes under a wage levy is money you cannot get back.
The IRS does not refund wages that were already garnished just because you later entered into a resolution agreement. The levy stops going forward — but what’s already been taken is gone.
If your employer has received a garnishment notice — even if the first reduced paycheck hasn’t arrived yet — the time to act is right now, today.
We have stopped wage garnishments with days to spare. We have gotten levies released between the notice and the first paycheck. But that requires moving fast.
What About My Tax Debt Itself?
Stopping the garnishment is the first step. Resolving the underlying debt is the second, and equally important, step.
A levy release without a resolution plan is temporary. The IRS granted you a reprieve; they did not forgive the debt. If no approved resolution is in place, the IRS can issue a new levy.
The goal is to stop the garnishment and simultaneously put a permanent resolution in place that gets the IRS out of your paycheck — and out of your life — for good.
This Is Especially Common During Tax Season
Every spring, people file their tax returns and discover they owe more than they expected — sometimes far more. Some people can’t pay. Some people owe from prior years and now realize the IRS is out of patience.
If you file your return and can’t pay what you owe, or if you’re already behind from previous years, the IRS will not simply wait indefinitely. A wage garnishment often happens when someone has been ignoring the problem or genuinely didn’t know they had one.
If you owe the IRS and you haven’t made arrangements to pay, don’t wait for them to contact your employer. Get ahead of it now.
A Word About What We Do Differently
Tax relief companies advertise constantly on television and radio. They promise settlements for pennies on the dollar and make the process sound simple.
Here is the truth: most of those companies are not run by attorneys. Many charge large upfront fees, produce disappointing results, and leave clients in worse shape than before.
Sheldon Lazarow is a licensed attorney with 50 years of legal experience — including decades as a trial attorney. He has spent 25 years handling IRS cases in Tucson and Southern Arizona. He does not hand your case off to a paralegal or a case manager. He handles it personally.
When he contacts the IRS on your behalf, he is not reading from a script. He is negotiating from a position of deep legal knowledge and the kind of tenacity that comes only from a career spent fighting for clients in courtrooms and in front of federal agencies.
Serving Tucson and All of Southern Arizona
Lazarow Law Firm, P.L.C., represents clients facing IRS wage garnishments throughout Tucson, Oro Valley, Marana, Green Valley, Sierra Vista, Bisbee, Benson, Douglas, Nogales, Florence, and all of Pima, Cochise, Santa Cruz, and Pinal counties.
Call Today — Before Your Next Paycheck
📞 (520) 623-5856
Free, no-obligation consultation. If your employer has received a garnishment notice, every day without an attorney is a paycheck you may not get back.
Don’t wait for the next one to arrive short.
Sheldon Lazarow is a Tucson, Arizona tax attorney with 50 years of legal experience, including 25 years of IRS tax debt resolution. Licensed to practice before the IRS, all Arizona and California state and federal courts, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, and the United States Tax Court. Lazarow Law Firm, P.L.C. | 25 E. University Blvd., Tucson, AZ 85705.