If you file injured spouse the portion of the tax refund that they consider yours will go to you and the portion that they consider your spouses will go to pay his backed child support. Why would you even want to be with someone who dodges his financial obligations like this is beyond me. Heaven forbid you ever have children and split up you'll too be left high and dry.

Injured spouses refer to the spouse who does not owe child-support and whose refund would be adversely affected by the refund being taken and applied to back child-support. It protects the refund of spouse who did not incur the debt but still applies the refund from the other spouse to the back debt.

When I filed jointly and my then-husband owed back support his other child, I filed as an injured spouse when filing our taxes. It protected my refund from being taken to pay his debt. The support he owed was for a child not from our marriage, therefore I was not legally required to have my refund applied to his debt.

Any refund I was due was sent to me and any portion of the refund that would have been his was taken and applied to his debt.