Expansion of Self-Correction for Electronic Filers and Other Improvements Could Reduce Taxpayer Burden and Costs Associated With Tax Return Error Resolution

The Commissioner, Wage and Investment Division, should develop processes and procedures that provide taxpayers with the opportunity to self-correct errors on accepted e-filed returns that are suspended from processing for manual error resolution in an effort to reduce unnecessary burden on taxpayers and processing costs incurred by the IRS.

The Commissioner, Wage and Investment Division, should expand processes and procedures for developing error resolution criteria to include an assessment of the potential reduction in taxpayer burden and cost savings to the IRS that can be gained by using additional tax return data to develop systemic error resolution processes.

The Commissioner, Wage and Investment Division, should review existing error codes to identify opportunities to expand the use of available tax return data to systemically resolve the error condition for both paper and e-filed tax returns and reduce the number of e-filed tax returns from unnecessarily being identified for manual review.

The Commissioner, Wage and Investment Division, should develop processes to systemically suspend and reactivate tax returns when processing must be suspended until computer programming or other actions necessary to ensure the accurate processing of these returns can be completed.

The Commissioner, Wage and Investment Division, should develop processes to systemically monitor the Error Resolution program, including processes to monitor error code volumes real-time as well as in comparison to historical data.