Government and Politics

Why The IRS Infuriates Taxpayers

The National Commission on Restructuring the Internal Revenue Service has come up with some telling statistics on the way the agency conducts its operations.

Here are a few items:

  • The IRS answers only 50 percent of taxpayers' calls, compared to a private industry standard of 90 percent to 95 percent.

  • The IRS puts taxpayers on hold for an average of seven minutes, while the private sector standard is to answer 80 percent of calls within 20 seconds.

  • Paper tax returns have a 22 percent error rate, half caused by the IRS itself.

  • Certified public accountants estimate that 87 percent of the 103 million notices sent out by the agency last year were so poorly written that taxpayers couldn't figure out what needed to be done.

Senate hearings on IRS abuses established that poor training of agents causes taxpayers many problems, a fact critics claim is demonstrated by a more than 50 percent drop in recoveries by the agency if the taxpayers take their case to the Tax Court.

Taxpayers owe interest compounded daily if they underpay. But even innocent errors can pile up hefty bills because it takes the IRS 18 months to match data from W-2 and other forms to returns.

Source: National Commission on Restructuring the IRS, "Rating the IRS," box in editorial, "Out-of-Whack IRS Needs Steady Hand at Controls," USA Today, October 10, 1997.

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