e-filing pace lags 2.2% from year-ago, but professionals hang on to market share.
by beth bellor
coronavirus has changed much of society as we know it, but taxes remain a certainty.
more: tax pro irs filings lag by 532,000 | tax pro e-filings lag by 512,000 returns | tax pros kick into high gear | slow start for tax pro e-filing | data points down as tax season opens | the fight for new tax clients
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total returns, e-filings and average refunds are up, although tax pros are e-filing slower than last year.
as of the week ending march 20, the latest data released, the irs had received 84.2 million individual income tax returns, up 0.2 percent from the same period a year ago. it had processed 81.2 million returns, down 0.5 percent.
the agency’s processing rate was steady at 96.4 percent.
e-filing receipts
e-filings at 79.7 million were up 0.6 percent. tax professionals submitted 41 million of those, down 2.2 percent, while self-preparers, at 38.7 million, were up 3.6 percent.
pros handled 51.5 percent of e-filings, slightly ahead of last week’s 50.3 percent. that’s even though they processed 908,000 fewer returns than in 2019.
website visits
visits to the irs.gov website totaled 369.3 million, up 8.6 percent.
refunds
there were 65.1 million refunds issued in the total amount of $191.1 billion, down 1.1 percent and 0.4 percent respectively. the average refund of $2,936 was up 0.7 percent.
there were 55.6 million direct deposit refunds issued, down 6.6 percent, in the total amount of $171.2 billion, down 5.1 percent. direct deposit refunds averaged $3,079, up 1.6 percent.