This one appears to be real!  It gets entered on Line 71 of 2006 1040 — “Federal Excise Tax Refund Credit”.  You get this money no matter whether you itemize deductions or whatever else you do or don’t do, and regardless of whether you owe (you’ll owe less) or are getting a refund (you’ll get a bigger refund).

 More info at snopes.com or IRS: 
http://www.snopes.com/business/taxes/excise.asp 
http://www.irs.gov/newsroom/article/0,,id=161506,00.html 
http://www.irs.gov/businesses/small/article/0,,id=160214,00.html 
A federal excise tax has been charged to you on your phone bill for years.  It is an old tax that was assessed on your toll calls based on how far the call was being made and how much time you talked on that call.  When phone companies began to offer flat fee phone service, challenges to the excise tax ended up in federal courts in several districts of the Country.  The challenges pointed out that flat fee/rate phone service had nothing to do with the distance and the length of the phone call.  Therefore, the excise tax should/could not be assessed.  The IRS has now conceded this argument.  Phone companies have been given notice to stop assessing the federal excise tax as of Aug 30, 2006.  You will most likely see the tax on your September cut-off statement, but it should NOT be on your October bill.  But the challengers of the old law also demanded restitution.  So the IRS has announced that a one time credit will be available when you and I file our 2006 tax return.