IRS Forms Task Force to Examine Feasibility of Electronic Tax Filing Platform

The Internal Revenue Service has established a task force that would determine if the agency should create an electronic tax return submission platform.

According to a statement issued by the IRS on Feb. 8, it selected the think tank New America and Loyola Law School associate professor Ariel Jurow-Kleiman to serve on the task force. The statement noted that the third-party experts would study the feasibility of an IRS-run direct file tax return system, pursuant to the Inflation Reduction Act.

The IRS said it is on track to deliver the first report regarding the system’s viability in May, Federal News Network reported.

The task force will focus on the approach, schedule, cost organizational design and the agency’s capacity to deliver the direct e-file tax return system and if it would be feasible to provide the service in different tiers based on taxpayers’ income and tax return complexity. The system that would be developed should be multilingual and mobile-friendly and should contain data safeguards.

Lawmakers are also asking the IRS to gather input from the public about the proposed system.

Associate professor Jurow-Kleiman is a tax expert who explores how tax policies affect low-income and vulnerable households at all levels of government. New America is an organization that identifies the challenges that people face as technology and society continue to change and proposes solutions to benefit the public.

The IRS, under its decades-old Free File program, has been working with private companies to provide free electronic tax preparation and filing services for taxpayers who meet certain criteria. A Government Accountability Office report issued in April 2022 found that only around 4 percent of all eligible taxpayers used the program to file their tax returns.

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