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EXTENSION SNAFU?

June 08, 2006

California tax blogger Russ Fox says a number of taxpayers and their preparers are going to get some adiditional gray hairs courtesy of IRS:

According to the Fresno IRS Service Center, around 40,000 to 50,000 extensions filed using Form 4868 were wrongly denied at the Fresno IRS campus. Most of the forms were transmitted in bulk via paid preparers. The IRS is now notifying impacted taxpayers and preparers that the extension(s) is allowed and that they should ignore the previous communication.

If your extension was denied, and it was filed in Fresno, do nothing until July. Then if you feel it was wrongly denied, and you have not heard from the IRS, you should request a reconsideration using the process noted in the denial letter.

Apparently "human error" caused the problem, specifically misstamping incoming extension forms. That's reassuring, in that the folks working at service centers are actual humans. Still it teaches two lessons:

1. If you file using paper forms, be sure to do so using "Certified Mail, Return Receipt Requested" to document that you filed on time.

2. If you extend electronically, you don't have to worry about whether somebody at the service center is using the right stamp on your extension form.

The Fresno service center processes returns for Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, South Dakota, Utah, Washington and Wyoming.

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