ST. PAUL, Minn. - The Minnesota Department of Revenue announced today that the processing of nearly 540,000 tax returns impacted by changes made only to the treatment of Unemployment Insurance (UI) compensation and/or Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loan forgiveness is complete. The department sent out over $300 million in the form of refunds or a reduction in taxes owed to taxpayers whose returns were impacted.

Around 3,000 other returns remain to be manually processed. These returns either have non-UI/PPP conformity adjustments or have UI/PPP adjustments plus other conformity adjustments that require additional time to review and process due to their complexity. 

“Getting the UI and PPP impacted returns processed was a top priority for the department in the second half of last year as we know these refunds are important to Minnesotans impacted by the pandemic in 2020,” said Revenue Commissioner Robert Doty. “Developing, testing, and launching a system to accurately adjust hundreds of thousands of already filed returns was a new challenge for the staff at Revenue. They were able to accomplish that while also completing the regular work that occurs during this time of year which includes processing more than 850,000 property tax refunds, updating forms and instructions, and preparing for the upcoming tax filing season.”  

Timeline: 

July 1 – Tax law changes relating to Unemployment Insurance (UI) compensation, Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loan forgiveness signed into law.   

Late July – Updated 2020 tax forms and instructions released.  

Mid-August - Nearly 8,000 letters sent to individual taxpayers who will need to file an amended return to receive the UI and/or PPP loan forgiveness or take advantage of other provisions from the tax law change. 

Mid-September – Manual processing of the more 126,000 returns began. These returns had complicated tax circumstances and required additional time and work by Revenue employees to complete. 

Early October – All 2,100+ returns impacted by PPP changes filed at the corporate entity level processed. 

Late October – Systematic adjustment of returns began with a goal of processing 50,000 returns per week thereafter. 

Late December - Systematic processing of more than 417,000 returns completed. 

Late January – Processing of around 540,000+ UI and/or PPP-only returns completed. 

Note: The 540,000+ total processed returns figure does NOT include: 

• Returns that the department asked the taxpayer to amend 

• Returns that were impacted but showed no tax change and thus no action was taken 

• Returns in various stages of the appeals process 

Taxpayers who think they qualified but did not receive a refund or a letter explaining changes to their returns can contact the department at 651-296-3781. 

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