During the processing of income tax returns, the IRS validates SSNs based on the first 4 letters of the taxpayer’s surname. The IRS notifies us on Department of Treasury Form 3857 when two people file tax returns using the same SSN. Form 3857 is both a notification of a possible scrambled earnings problem and a request for the correct SSN of each taxpayer.

In joint return cases, the first spouse is usually the individual involved because joint returns are controlled under the primary’s SSN. However, the scrambled wages may belong to the second spouse. NOTE: In such instances, the second spouse's first name will be underlined on the Form 3857 and the investigation should be conducted on the second spouse, not the first spouse.