 internal revenue source IRS tax news IRS begins new digital intake initiative form 940 scanning process off to strong start other forms to start soon New digital intake. Yeah, I knew it. They're after my Bitcoin again. Oops. I shouldn't have aired my Suspicions like that Phil Phil cut that part out. Otherwise our podcast is at risk Now, you know how dead set the government is against allowing free speech and information flow, you know They're they're likely to boldly shut down our god-given natural right to free speech and association Directly from the Senate floor itself for crying out loud Just like they did with that January 6th footage thing I urge Fox News to order Carlson to cease propagating the big lie on his network. No, okay, Phil It's just because the footage was cherry-picked, right by diving deep into the waters of conspiracy and cherry-picking So so let me let me get this straight Chuck Schumer is accusing other people of cherry-picking the footage that they themselves could have released any time over the last two years But intentionally and deliberately decided not to because it wasn't helpful to their narrative of Democracy dies in darkness. I mean honestly, Phil That's like that's like saying like LeBron James sitting under the basketball hoop for ten minutes Well action is going on on the other side of the court then catching a lob thrown the entire Distance of the court and then like pointing to to Stefan Curry or something as he's dunking the ball Calling the other guy the cherry-picker in the situation. I mean, it's it's kind of ridiculous I mean as one of the referees in this democracy I must call the person withholding the footage for over two years Painting an incomplete picture and creating a narrative that they were like honest Abe or something is The cherry-picker not the person adding pieces to the puzzle, you know stop stop trying to flop on the ground To draw a foul Schumer. I mean it's it's embarrassing. You're embarrassing yourself So many others who were here in the Capitol and millions and millions of Americans are just furious It's ridiculous Because like the new puzzle pieces reveal a slightly different picture One showing the government not only cherry-picking or even simply cutting down the cherry tree in line about it The picture seems to show the government mowing down cherry trees with like one of those cutting machines and Dr. Seuss is the Lorax well pointing to the nearest bystander to blame for the property destruction Yeah, okay, Phil. I know I know I know we're banned from saying dr. Seuss Just just cut it out. I guess cut that part out. Anyways, I'm telling you these people I'm afraid are no honest Abe therefore, I call for renewed strengthening of the government checks and restoration of the government balances Last night millions of Americans tuned into one of the most shameful hours. We have ever seen on cable television Honestly, has this guy ever even seen like a reality TV show like possibly one of those old like Jerry Springer shows where they're fighting on stage or something like that I mean I are 2023 dash 41 March 8th 2023 Washington as part of ongoing Transformation efforts the internal revenue service announced today the successful expansion of digital scanning and a major step in the new digital Intake scanning initiative the IRS has already scanned more than 120,000 paper form 940 since the start of 2023 this is a 20-fold increase compared to all of 2022 I think that's kind of a split sentence or a run-on sentence right there It shouldn't that be like a period and then like this is a 20-fold increase because that's like a this could stand alone Not as a fragment, but I mean, I'm not an egg. I've been practicing my English. I'm not maybe I'm wrong on that But I feel like that should be a separate sense But any case this effort will expand soon to include scanning a form 1040 as well as form 941 the scanning effort is part of a multi form multi-solution scanning initiative known as digital intake quote this expansion of scanning is another milestone for the IRS as we work to transform the agency in quote said Acting IRS Commissioner Doug O'Donnell quote we anticipate expanding scanning of more paper returns in the near future Saving time and creating efficiencies for taxpayers the business community as well as tax professionals and the IRS That's a lot of helping a lot of people improved situations there Digital scanning is part of a larger effort underway at the IRS to transform the agency and make improvements for taxpayers as Part of the inflation reduction act. Oh my goodness. It's the inflation reduction act. I knew it They're saving they're making inflation go down by lessening the paper distribution And maybe some of that paper is like money that they're printing or something so they'll somehow that will Decrease the inflation or something maybe I don't know I wish they'd tell us how these stuff is linked to the inflation because we read we read about this inflation reduction act like all the time over here at the IRS news and they I never see it linked to like Reducing inflation, which is always the first thing that comes to mind when I hear that the title But any case the IRS has taken steps to improve service including hiring more than 5,000 new telephone assistors Will that reduce inflation adding staff to IRS taxpayer assistance centers? Huh, does that reduce inflation and holding special Saturday hours? I Don't think that would reduce inflation at all Expanding the document upload tool and other features Okay, but how does that inflation doesn't I don't see any linkage that the linkage is missing The IRS has been using various technologies to scan tax returns for more than 35 years But recently took a leap forward by leveraging cutting-edge technologies via revolutionary Procurement approach to test their effectiveness The capabilities enable the iris to digitalize more paper for downstream processing and storage Resulting in greater efficiencies and approved data management outcomes Now I would assume that these are types of things that businesses have been doing for some time and I am I do think it's a good thing that the iris updates their systems over there and starts to get into the modern Age and whatnot. So that is a good thing I wish they wouldn't fund it through a bill called inflation reduction act just out route lying to people about the bill But you know at least hopefully they spend some of that money Uh improving things so in addition to contracts with industry partners, the iris is also working with treasury bureau Of the fiscal service and lock box financial agent to expand the reach of this work Current scanning initiatives currently underway at the iris cover digital intake with lock box lock box financial agents FAs are banks that specialize in payment processing But until now have not taken the extra step to scan and process tax forms Each year millions of taxpayers send payments and associated tax forms to these lock box banks the lock box project works To scan paper returns onsite and e-file those returns All right, that went a little bit over my head, but it sounds like it could be good digital intake with industry partners I like work with the lock box financial agents. This process extracts machine readable information from paper tax returns and then e-files those returns So these efforts with industry partners via contracts Issued the iris allow the iris to process forms that are received directly by the iris So possibly they can take some of their paper Forms and and convert them to digital format. I believe is the idea there which sounds like a good idea However, you would think that the paper forms. They're trying to they're trying to Remove the paper forms altogether So it seems like if they're paying a lot of money to convert paper forms to digital format When the digital paper forms will probably be non-existent at some time. That's kind of a question in terms of how long Uh a benefit that kind of thing will be but in any case Quote we are making significant progress in this effort and we look to expand scanning efforts dramatically in months ahead And working toward a fully digital future in quotes said enterprise Digitalization and case management office code director Harrison smith quite the title quite the title it takes almost an entire line You know that dude's important because his title's like a whole line almost quote We're building a foundation that will enable us to help uh taxpayers and businesses For years to come in quote the vast majority of tax returns are now filed electronically But millions of forms are still filed by paper Which means a time consuming process of manually handling and transcribing of these tax returns by providing a cup capability to scan And electronically processed paper returns The irs will be able to shorten the processing time for taxpayers who who file paper returns That's great. Maybe you could start answering the phone now Now that we spent all this money with a bill called the inflation reduction act That we took all the money and spent it on all this other stuff, which was a total lie. It seems like Then maybe you can like answer the phone now that we gave you all that money Could you just like answer the phone when we call sometimes? We're kind of any case quote technology powers tax administration And we have completed important work over the last year to help people get the assistance They need and reduce paper in addition to improving the agency's underlying technology infrastructure Wow, those are a lot of big words and quotes that irs chief information officer nancy seager So I don't know. I don't know what they just said right there, but i'm impressed by the vocabulary So i'm sure it's going to be a benefit. I've got to be worth all that money Quote this is another positive step in the future technology direction for the irs that includes improving service to taxpayers and quote well I don't know and there but there's a link. There's links to some of that stuff here So you can look into it a bit more. I'm glad they're kind of updating the thing They're spending the money You know, I'd rather they spend it up on that rather than like some some shell game like You know energy power company That's not even an energy power company or something that goes under because or whatever, but I don't know You could check it out here. There'll be a link to this in the description