There were quite a few posts this year with folks thinking those payments were tied to a specific kid.  So in this case we collected for one kid (let's call him Darryl) that no longer exists for that tax return so we got free money for Darryl that we don't have to pay back.  Now let's move on to his brother Darryl.  We only got $1500 for him and now we want the other half of the credit.  It just don't work that way.  The IRS doesn't care if Larry moved back home and his brother Darryl and his other brother Darryl ran off to join the circus.  When the return is filed there is only one qualifying kid and Larry is the kid even though you didn't get a dime previously for him.