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IRS GIVES UP ON PLANS TO CUT BACK TELEPHONE SERVICE
January 24, 2006
From Tax Analysts:
After two congressional actions and continual clashes with advocacy groups, the IRS has officially abandoned plans to cut its telephone helpline hours.
The National Treasury Employees Union announced on January 23 that the IRS sent word late January 20 that it would scrap plans to cut daily helpline hours from 15 to 12, the second time over the last year the IRS has backed away from service cuts under congressional pressure. The IRS concession arrived in a one-line notification e-mail without further explanation, the NTEU said, ending a bargaining process the union was entering under protest.
“Good riddance to this ill-conceived plan that would have made it more difficult for taxpayers to voluntarily comply with their tax obligations,” said NTEU President Colleen M. Kelley.
This is good news for taxpayers who want more time to get an answer that will be wrong about one time out of four.
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Comments
They should cut back on phone service in favor of electronic communications. Remember your discussion of accrual-to-cash method changes for S-corp banks? That's a bad case of asymetrical information.
Can you imagine if designated IRS personnel were allowed to interact with practitioners online? For example, what if IRS agents could comment on ABA-Tax, misc.taxes.moderated, or one of the other tax forums? What if regulation projects were blogged instead of being subject to the antiquated notice-and-comment procedures?
Posted by: Brian | January 24, 2006 9:04 AM