The IRS effort each year to process the millions of paper documents each year can be described as herculean. Taxpayers have been limited by the types of correspondence and forms that are available to be electronically submitted to the IRS for many years. Thanks to the Inflation Reduction Act, the IRS has started making changes that greatly expand its efforts to provide more options for taxpayers to file electronically in the coming years.
On 18 August 2023, the IRS introduced its plan to implement paperless processing for all correspondence, non-tax forms, and responses to notices in a major overhaul of the filing system scheduled to be fully implemented by the 2025 tax filing season. In anticipation of the changes this overhaul brings, the IRS is making twenty (20) of the most commonly used tax forms available for electronic filing (e-file) starting in the 2024 tax year. These include amendments to Forms 940, 941, 941-SS, and 941 (payroll forms). Thankfully with the IRS’s Herculean Effort, an additional 150 of the most used non-tax forms will be made available in 2025.
Together with the broadened category of non-tax forms available for e-filing, efforts are now underway to improve automated digitization of paper returns, better digital and mobile-friendly versions of forms, and enhance customer service. Combined, these efforts will greatly improve the time needed to process a document and cut the time taxpayers are waiting on refunds.
Those taxpayers that still want to correspond with the IRS via traditional methods, will still have the option to send in a letter. Whether you respond to the IRS via the new electronic methods available or by paper, it helps to consult a tax expert to ensure you are responding to what the IRS has requested and in a way that the IRS can act upon. For the IRS’s Herculean Effort, we know the IRS’s language.
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