Balance due & the collection ladder
The IRS has filed a Notice of Federal Tax Lien — a public record telling your creditors the government claims your property for a tax balance — and this letter gives you the right to appeal the filing at a hearing.
Last stop
The IRS has filed a Notice of Federal Tax Lien — a public record telling your creditors the government claims your property for a tax balance — and this letter gives you the right to appeal the filing at a hearing.
Why you got it: A balance went unpaid and unarranged long enough for the IRS to protect its claim publicly.
Not a levy: a lien doesn't take anything today. But it is public, it attaches to what you own and what you acquire, and the hearing right to challenge it runs on a short clock printed on the letter.
Your first move: Find the request-by date printed on the letter and calendar it. A timely hearing request (Form 12153) is how you challenge the filing or propose alternatives before Appeals.
Every clock runs from this date — not from the day the letter reached you.
Keeps Appeals and Tax Court open and puts alternatives on the record.
A paid balance can qualify for lien withdrawal — different from release — which matters for your record.
Direct-debit plans under $25,000 can qualify for withdrawal after three on-time payments.
Form 12153 to the address on the letter, certified mail, return receipt — and use the letter's printed request-by date.
A filed lien is verifiable: it sits in your county's public records and in your IRS account. Scam letters invent liens that exist in neither.
The lien stays public — it can complicate selling or borrowing against property — until the balance is paid or the 10-year collection clock expires. The equivalent-hearing fallback lasts one year (for lien notices, one year plus five business days) without Tax Court review.
Where this sits on the ladder: This letter stands on its own track — see the collection ladder for the enforcement road.
One payment. No subscription. Yours to keep — every notice, every letter, every script.