New to the clearance world, tax return SF-85P question

Hi all, I’ve browsed around a bit, but am a bit confused about how this might affect me and if there are any actions beyond the obvious I should take to help with the process. I’ve received a job offer for a role that involves an SF-85P, but I’m a few years behind on filing returns. I shouldn’t have any tax debt owed, and embarrassingly enough I didn’t really realize that filing was as big of a deal if you didn’t owe anything extra. The last time I filed was in 2021, and I was also behind, and submitted because I was buying a house and my agent said I needed to have a few years of returns for the lender to see, which made sense.

Obviously I’m heading to HR Block as soon as I can get all my paperwork together to file a bunch as soon as I can, and I’m planning to be totally upfront about this on my application as well as expressing that I understand the need to consistently file every year going forward. I don’t know what I don’t know about the process, though, is there anything I should be aware of or do proactively to put myself in the best position here?

For what it’s worth, I should be pretty clean otherwise. No criminal history, no traffic citations for over 8 years, very high credit score, no drug use past college (over a decade ago), etc. My only other negative mark would be that my last job was terminated for performance, but it was more the “not timely with following up” side, not “can’t do the job”.

I really appreciate any feedback or information from people with infinitely more experience about the process than me.

If it was for a clearance, I wouldn’t bother, but they’re not as strict with Public Trust. I’m thinking you probably still will need some time to mitigate. Maybe after you file all your late returns and get up to date so you can have all the documentation from the IRS in hand. It may take a year or 2 for all that. But you can certainly give it a go now and see what happens.

And just be ready for a lot of “why did you not file for so many years?” and “do you think you’re above the law?” questions.

Your credit score does not factor into the process at all.

Not filing taxes is an issue, especially if it’s a “pattern”. 5 years is a pattern. Show that you have taken steps to mitigate it, be prepared to answer the “why” questions and if cleared do not miss that annual deadline again.

Good luck to you.

Not filing taxes for 5 years is definitely an issue for individuals placed Public Trust positions which are held to a higher standard of integrity and trustworthiness. Here is an example case:

https://doha.ogc.osd.mil/Industrial-Security-Program/Industrial-Security-Clearance-Decisions/ISCR-Hearing-Decisions/2024-ISCR-Hearing/FileId/221773/