the top six irs #fails this tax season (so far)

sending out notices with expired deadlines? check.

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by 卡塔尔世界杯常规比赛时间 research

it’s been a hard year for everyone, from pauper to president to tax practitioners. the latter have been triple-whammied by the need to keep clients and employees healthy, the shifting rules and deadlines made to accommodate the lockdown and the staggering, stumbling service of the internal revenue … well, service.

more on tax season 2020: tax pros handling bigger share of e-filings | how covid has pulverized irs operations | the mystery of 10 million missing tax returns | covid cuts accounting profits | why busy season may never be the same again | getting a handle on covid |

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let us pause to pity poor erin m. collins, who late last year landed a great new job: national tax advocate. she replaces nina olson, who held that position from 2001 to 2019, bowing out in the nick of time, leaving behind an impressive record of improvements in the american system of tax collection.

when collins accepted the job, way back in yesteryear, she had no idea of the upheaval she’d have to deal with. she got hit with her own triple whammy: keeping the tax advocacy service healthy and functional, grappling with the usual array of irs shortcomings along with the unusual new ones, and helping taxpayers reach timely, equitable solutions with a skeleton crew of agents.

so far, she’s held up well, producing an annual report to congress that addresses a daunting pile of challenges.

the covid-19 challenges are daunting in themselves, and they relate to the daunting frustrations of cpas, tax practitioners and their clients.

here are the top 6 stumbles at the irs:

1. taxpayers who filed a 2019 paper return may be in for a long wait.

to prevent the decimation of its ranks, the irs had to suspend the processing of paper returns. as of may 16, it had a backlog of 4.7 million returns. there were more waiting in mail facilities. the catch-up has begun, but it’s still not up to speed.

2. some taxpayers whose returns were mistakenly flagged by filters are also in for long waits.

all tax returns pass through fraud and identity theft filters, but the false positive rate is more than 50 percent. many are inevitably for earned income tax credit or additional child tax credit, both of which often represent a substantial part of family incomes. flagged filers are asked to submit documentation. trouble is, there are no agents to check the docs. the irs will get to this deluge of docs when it gets to it, which will not be soon.

3. individuals who did not get their economic impact payments will have to wait until … next year!

the irs says that those who have not received their eips will (not may) have to wait until they file their 2020 returns to get credits on their 2020 tax liabilities.

4. taxpayers needing irs assistance have had trouble getting it.

well duh, right? here’s why: the irs shut down its accounts management phone lines, its taxpayer assistance centers, its mail operations, its smoke signal receivers, its telegraph operations, and all carrier pigeons stations.  the only way to get through is at irs.gov and on automated phone lines. regular operations are just beginning to reopen.

5. official irs notices could not be mailed between april 8 and may 31.

consequently, notices going out now often have wrong dates, such as deadlines that have already passed. corrections may appear on inserted notices, which are easily lost in the shuffle.

6. the tas is having difficulty helping taxpayers.

tas case advocates have been working remotely, but ultimately their advocacy depends on the authorization of an irs agent. said agent may be hard to find. the solution may be simple, but there’s a covid-19 gap between the tas and the irs.

it wouldn’t be fair to blame the irs for all these problems and delays. it’s a big agency involving a lot of staff and hundreds of millions of clients who are dealing with an incredibly complex tax code and often a truly burdensome tax liability.

what can tax practitioners do? one helpful measure would be to inform clients of the cause of the delays and complications. clients’ sympathy might be limited, but a better understanding might lead to patience and less stress all around.

posted on july 6, 2020