The IRS is quicker to answer the phone on this Tax Day

WASHINGTON (AP) — On this Tax Day, the IRS is promoting the customer service improvements the agency rolled out since receiving tens of billions in new funding dollars through Democrats’ Inflation Reduction Act.

From cutting phone wait times to digitizing more documents and improving the “Where’s My Refund” tool to show more account details in plain language, agency leadership is trying to bring attention to what’s been done to repair the agency’s image as an outdated and maligned tax collector.

The promotion also in part is meant to quickly normalize a more efficient and effective IRS before congressional Republicans threaten another round of cuts to the agency. So time is of the essence for both taxpayers and the agency this season.

“This filing season, the IRS has built off past successes and reached new milestones,” Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said on a Friday call with reporters. “It’s showing that when it has the resources it needs, it will provide taxpayers the service they deserve.”

“Delivering tax season is a massive undertaking,” said IRS Commissioner Daniel Werfel. “We greatly appreciate people in many different areas working long hours to serve taxpayers as the tax deadline approaches.”

For most people, April 15 is the last day to submit tax returns or to file an extension and the IRS says it has received more than 100 million tax returns, with tens of millions more expected to be filed.

The IRS says call wait times have been cut down to three minutes this tax season, compared with the average 28 minutes in 2022. That has saved taxpayers 1.4 million hours of hold time and the agency has answered 3 million more calls compared with the same time frame. Also, an updated “Where’s My Refund” tool giving more