Paycheck decrease when I removed additional withholding

Forum|Forum|11 months ago
May 2, 2025
3 replies
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Hi - In an attempt to not have a large tax bill, we accidentally over corrected our witholdings last year and got a significant refund. I recently updated my W4 to remove the additional $200 federal withholding and my paycheck decreased? I didn’t change anything else and claim zero dependents. The federal withholding now shows $180 more than what it was with the additional $200? I did get a $4k raise. Did I get bumped up a tax bracket maybe?

SharonD007

You may have. You can review the tax brackets for 2024 Federal income tax rates and brackets here.

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NCPERSON1

@Elb123456 going into the next tax bracket would not be the issue as your income is mor than the tax, i.e. the paycheck should still go up.

Suggest using the IRS estimator tool to ensure EACH paycheck has the correct withholdings.

https://www.irs.gov/individuals/tax-withholding-estimator

AmeliesUncle

If I had to guess, you previously did not have Box 2 checked on the W-4 and this time you did have the box checked (checking the box withholds more tax).

Another possibility is that your employer entered something differently in their payroll software than what your W-4 shows.

VolvoGirl

@Elb123456 Check each line on your paycheck. Is the gross wages the same, etc? I would check with the employer to see if you filled out the W4 right or the employer entered it right and how to adjust it. There is a new W4, it doesn't ask for # of dependents. Did you fill out the old W4 or the new W4?

https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/fw4.pdf