WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Representative Peter Meijer (R-MI) today joined Representative Susan Wild (D-PA) in introducing the bipartisan Better Service for Taxpayers Act, a bill that works to improve the timeliness, accuracy, efficiency, and responsiveness of the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). Year after year, Americans have dealt with a slow and often unresponsive IRS. This legislation works to resolve these longstanding taxpayer service issues by increasing responses to taxpayers’ phone calls and questions and better communicating with taxpayers about the status of their tax returns.
“During the last tax filing season, only nine percent of taxpayers’ calls to the IRS were answered by a customer service representative, and as of December, the agency had more than six million unprocessed individual tax returns,” said Rep. Meijer. “Tax season is here once again, and American taxpayers deserve much better service from the IRS, so Congress must act. I am proud to help introduce the bipartisan Better Service for Taxpayers Act to address some of the ongoing issues at the IRS, decrease the backlog of returns, and prevent it from happening again.”
“I am proud to introduce the Better Service for Taxpayers Act to bring commonsense reforms to the IRS that will result in more efficient and responsive service for taxpayers,” said Rep. Wild. “When taxpayers call the IRS, they should be able to speak with an employee who can advise them on their questions and accurately check the status of their filing, regardless of whether it was submitted electronically or by mail. I am proud to work across the aisle with Congressman Meijer to ensure our constituents get the quality service they need from the IRS.”
Every year during tax season, the IRS leaves thousands of phone calls from taxpayers unanswered and requests for assistance unaddressed. The Better Service for Taxpayers Act would ensure that the IRS has employees available to answer phone calls from taxpayers during standard business hours, including 7:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. local time, Mondays through Fridays. Exacerbating these communication deficiencies further, taxpayers currently have no way of tracking receipt of their hard copy tax returns after mailing to the IRS. To address this, the bill requires that, within 15 business days of receiving a hard copy mail tax return, the IRS will mail the taxpayer a letter confirming receipt that includes a phone number for assistance. This will give taxpayers a sense of certainty as they wait for their tax return to be processed and will provide them with a sure way to reach the IRS in the event that questions arise. Lastly, the bill calls for adequately funding the IRS, increasing staffing levels to address the huge backlog of unprocessed tax returns due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and modernizing IRS technology so returns can be processed more quickly and the issues taxpayers experience with the IRS can finally be comprehensively resolved.
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