 internal revenue service IRS tax news IRS continues work on inventory of tax returns original tax returns filed in 2021 to be completed this week but first an attempt at a joke we'll see that at the pub Biden explains how inflation is all Putin's fault it's Putin's inflation I tell you what's that you say no spending money like a drunken sailor money provided by the printing press that doesn't cause inflation hold on a second barkeep give us another round in your finest it's on the taxpayers tab now I'll tell you what causes inflation if you really want to know it's people like you running your mouth about my spending habits with your money mind your own dang business you see this cocktail right here my spending taxpayer dollars on this cocktail is actually saving the children but no you're too selfish to even think about how to save the children and don't understand how the economy works I mean come on man barkeep give this cocktail another squirt of that vintage baby formula everybody's crying about these days I hear it tastes great with one squirt costing more than this entire bar don't worry about the tab it's on the taxpayers cheers to saving the children IR 2022-128 June 21st 2022 Washington following intensive work during the past several months the internal revenue service announced today that processing on a key group of individual tax returns filed during 2021 will be completed by the end of this week so that's good news for those taxpayers however the reason they're telling us this is probably because they would have liked those to be processed sooner so due to issues related to the pandemic and staffing limitations the IRS began 2022 with a larger than usual inventory of paper tax returns and correspondence filed during 2021 so note if you think about the IRS as a separate entity then of course the rest of the government which is making the laws the iris then trying to execute the laws you can see that it should be true or would be true I would think that they had to deal with a lot of changes going on through the pandemic time frame with this issuing of the stimulus checks for example and then when you have the pen pandemic restrictions which were often being put in place from the top down it's probably going to hit the federal kind of agencies like the IRS first so I would think those would cause substantial restrictions for the processing time on the IRS as an entity in and of itself so the IRS took a number of steps to address this and the agency is on track to complete processing of originally filed form 1040 individual tax returns without errors received in 2021 this week business paper returns filed in 2021 will follow shortly after the IRS continues to work on the few remaining 2021 individual tax returns that have processing issues or require additional information from the taxpayer as of June 10th the IRS had processed more than 4.5 million of the more than 4.7 million individual paper tax returns received in 2021 the IRS has also successfully processed the vast majority of tax returns filed this year more than 143 million returns have been processed overall with almost 98 million refunds worth more than 298 billion dollars being issued amazing that we're able to process that many returns that is kind of incredible so all IRS employees continue working hard to process these and other tax returns filed in the in order received so notice when you're talking about the IRS they should be as a bureaucratic entity processing the returns in order of receipts and that's important to note because oftentimes we as taxpayers often think that their CPA firm or possibly if they contact the IRS they can get it to the head of the line or something like that and typically you would think that shouldn't be the case because it should be a bureaucratic organization that processes the return on a you know first in first out kind of method the IRS continues to receive current and prior year individual returns and related correspondence as people file extensions amended returns and a variety of business tax returns to date more than twice as many returns await processing compared to a typical year at this point in the calendar year although the IRS has worked through almost a million more returns to date than it had at this time last year so clearly these change these big bureaucratic agencies as well as the IRS tax code in and of itself is kind of designed to not have a whole lot of changes going on and we have had a whole lot of changes going on in terms of the tax law and in terms of sending out you know payments economic impact payments and of course the COVID restrictions I think most likely hit harder on the federal from the top down kind of thing because that's how that seemed to be how the the aim of the restrictions you know kind of we're going so you would think those things would cause problems to the IRS to move smoothly to work to address the unprocessed inventory by the end of this year the IRS has taken aggressive unprecedented steps to accelerate this important processing work while maintaining accuracy this effort included significant ongoing overtime for staff throughout 2022 creating special teams of employees focused solely on processing aged inventory and expediting hiring of thousands of new workers and contractors to help with this ongoing effort. Additionally, the IRS has greatly improved the process for taxpayers whose paper and electronically filed returns were suspended during processing for manual review and correction referred to as error and resolutions. Last filing season the IRS tax examiner could correct on average 70 tax returns with errors with errors per hour. Thanks to new technology implemented this filing season 180 to 240 returns can now be corrected per hour. So that seems good. So as of June 12 2021 there were 8.9 million tax returns in error and resolution as of June 10 2022 there were just 360,000 returns awaiting correction. The IRS will continue its intense effort to make progress on processing these paper returns in the months ahead. Quote, IRS employees have been working tirelessly to process these tax returns as quickly as possible and help people who are waiting on refunds or resolution of an account issue in quotes at IRS Commissioner Chuck Reddick quote completing the individual tax returns filed last year with no errors is a major milestone but there's still work to do. We remain focused on doing everything possible to expedite processing of these returns and we continue to add more people to this effort as our hiring efforts continue this summer in quote Reddick emphasize that adding sustained funding increases the IRS will help the agency add more employees to process tax returns and answer phones as well as help improve technology and ensure fair enforcement of the tax laws quote taxpayers and tax professionals deserve the absolute highest quality service from the nation's tax system in quote Reddick said quote long term and consistent funding for the agency is critical to ensuring the IRS is prepared for future tax seasons. It's also critical for the IRS to be ready to answer the call for the nation during the next crisis just as the agency did delivering the three rounds of historic stimulus payments and advanced child tax credit payments during the pandemic in quote. So clearly again traditionally the IRS in my opinion is something that we don't want to be changing all the time right you want the laws to be kind of stay somewhat the same from year to year and the processes that the IRS are using to say somewhat the same although they should be improving I would think but the idea that we should be prepping the IRS to to be able to handle just massive dumps of money into the economy every time we've declared that there's an emergency. You know I'm a little skeptical on on that because I'm not sure how well that worked out. I mean the stimulus payments were great but you know we're getting kind of hit with inflation now which I would think was going to out pass the stimulus. I'm not sure it was the best thing. I think people are going to be worse off in the long run from everything we did but in any case that's just my pessimistic opinion. So the IRS reminds millions of taxpayers who have not yet filed their 2021 tax returns this year including those who requested an extension until October 17 to make sure they filed their returns electronically with direct deposit to avoid delays. People who use e-file avoid the delays facing those who file paper returns e-file returns with no errors are typically processed in 21 days. The IRS also urges people to file as soon as they are ready. There's no need to wait until the last minute before the October 17 extension deadline. So that basically said you can send in your return early you know. You don't have to wait all you procrastinators that puts yourself on extension in the first. You don't have to wait till the last day because we would like him earlier. We don't need to flood at one time but but you know you know how it is. They're all procrastinators. That's why we put it on extension because we're going to wait till the last second. That's what we do. Anyways filing sooner avoids potential delays for taxpayers and it also assists the longer ongoing IRS efforts to complete processing tax returns this year. So you know you got a file on time because you help it out the IRS over there. So if that motivates you to get your tax return out so because you don't want to mess up their inventory processing staff. Okay anyways additional details on processing and other operations are available on a special page on irs.gov. There's a link to that special page right here and there'll be a link to this in the description.